Operation Phoenix
by the-notsoevil-queeen
Summary: After Regina and Robin return from the Heroes and Villains alternate reality, they find that Henry's magic as author didn't return them to the right place, or rather the right time. Now in the future, the couple stumbles upon a horrible moment yet to come, and Regina is determined to do anything she has to in order to save them from this fate. Outlaw Queen's Operation Save Robin.
1. Chapter 1

"OW! God – what the – Robin get off you're squishing me!"

"Hey! No need to shove, I didn't mean to."

Robin rolled off Regina, smacking his back hard on the wet grass as Regina sat up and rubbed the back of her head absently, her brow knitting in annoyance and confusion.

They sat in an open stretch of green grass, trees and bushes encircling them. It must have been some park in Storybrooke, one Regina had never bothered to visit with Henry for it's lack of a playground, so at least they made it out of the Enchanted Forest – or rather Isaac's twisted version of that realm.

Oh god – the alternate reality! They survived, _she_ survived. Regina shot a glance at Robin, splayed out on the ground, and he seemed to register the same thought she had just had. Robin launched off the ground and threw himself at her, wrapping his arms around her shoulders, clinging to her, tangling his fingers in her hair as he tucked his face in the crook of her neck and breathed in her scent.

"You're alive," he muttered, and she laughed softly, tears briefly wetting her eyes as the memory of everything they'd just lived through flashed through her mind. Bandits, an evil Snow, Robin and Zelena, a sword, pain, blood, Henry….

"Wait, where are we?" Regina pushed back from Robin slightly, still holding his arms firmly. "Where's Henry? Where's Emma?"

The couple looked around the misty park, not another soul around them. The sky gloomed a dark grey and the air was damp, rainfall clearly in their future. It was eerily quiet, almost unsettling, as if a single noise might wake the dead.

They pushed off the wet grass together and Regina held tight to Robin's arm as they walked towards a nearby path, hoping it would lead them to town, or to someone else who was dropped near them on their return to Storybrooke.

"I thought once Isaac's plan was undone, we'd return as if nothing had happened. Shouldn't we be where we were when we left - In the middle of town?"

Robin shrugged, as oblivious to their situation as Regina. They walked for a moment in confused silence, their hushed exhaling the only sound between them. It was cold enough that they could see their breath, but that didn't seem right. It was just the end of summer, not nearly cold enough for a heavy jacket let alone visible breath. Still, the wind was ice, and it cut through Regina's thin clothes, stung her cheeks and made her eyes run.

 _This isn't right, this doesn't make sense._

As they marched through the cold, the cover of dense trees began to thin and they could see that down their path was a larger opening than the one they had fallen into. The fear that had been weighing in Regina subsided as she recognized where they were – in the forest that surrounded the Storybrooke cemetery. They were on the opposite side of her vault and, as they stepped into the clearing, they could see the small stone building across the open plot of headstones.

They stopped in their tracks as their eyes fell on a large group of people standing in a cluster, black clothes covered by black umbrellas.

"What the…" Regina's voice trailed off as they approached the cluster of strangers. What happened? Did someone already die? Everyone just got back…

Robin inhaled sharply and yanked Regina's arm, pulling her behind a large bush that sat at the edge of the cemetery. Regina moved to protest, to tell him he pulled too hard and had hurt her, but he instantly shushed her. She looked at him in bewilderment, but his eyes were wide with shock, with fear, with something unrecognizable.

"Regina," Robin breathed, his jaw clenching between his words, "How are you standing beside me, and also walking towards me?"

Regina whipped her head to follow Robin's gaze, and her eyes landed on a small group indeed walking towards them - no, towards the crowd of black. Her eyes first fell on Henry and Emma, tucked under their own umbrella and dressed entirely in black, followed by Charming and Snow, and then a Zelena and…. _Regina_.

She was almost unrecognizable, a large dark hat atop her head, a sweeping cloak thrown over one shoulder, tall leather boots that met her pencil skirt at her knees, though it wasn't the clothes that were strange so much as the look on her face. She looked emotionless, frozen and numb, robotic but somehow broken.

"That's not possible," Regina said, her mind racing in time with the pounding of her heart. She watched herself step in front of the large group, though she never said a word, just turned and faced the coffin sitting before her, with Henry and Emma close by her side.

What is going on? How is she looking at herself, and Henry, and Emma, and the rest of her family? They weren't in Isaac's book anymore, Henry fixed that, they should be back in Storybrooke, exactly where they were when they were sucked into that alternate reality…

"Regina, I- I don't understand," Robin muttered, slowly shaking his head as he squeezed Regina's fingers absently.

"We must have time jumped, the way Emma and Hook did after Zelena died – or fake died," Regina explained, huffing her annoyance, "I guess Isaac's magic as the author was unstable and didn't return us to the right time."

"So did everyone else make it back?" Robin asked, hugging Regina to his hip. "Why are we the only ones who time travelled?"

"Who knows, but we should get out of here before we learn too much about our future. It appears someone we all know is dying." Regina's heart clenched at the thought of losing someone close enough to her that she should look so stone faced at their funeral. Though who could it be? Henry was there, Emma, the Charmings, even Zelena, the strangest of all the guests she'd seen approach.

"So how do we do that exactly?"

Regina paused, her eyes never leaving the sombre scene happening in front of her. "We need Emma, she's time travelled before, maybe she knows how to get us back."

"Alright, so we wait for the funeral to be over and we get her alone, ask her to send us home."

Regina nodded as she watched the last of the train of people join the crowd standing before the closed coffin. A man stepped forward, one Regina knew to be a part of Robin's Merry Men, though she didn't know his name, with something long and round dangling from a strap at his wrist. A quiver, stuffed full with arrows.

The man slowly pulled a single arrow from the quiver and placed it on the coffin in front of him before turning to face the crowd, taking his time to give a single arrow to each person before him. When he got to Regina, Henry stepped in front and took one for her, and they locked eyes for a moment before she dropped hers to the coffin again. Each person Regina knew took an arrow, Emma, Snow, Charming, Zelena, but one person didn't. One person wasn't there, wasn't standing beside her holding her hand, wasn't standing with his son, who was tucked in front of Little John's legs.

 _No._

Regina took Robin's hand and squeezed, to reassure her that he was there with her. He was here with her, but he wasn't there, across the cemetery with the other Regina. If this was the future, and Regina was alone at a funeral, looking so numb and heartbroken….

"Oh god," Regina whispered, her throat tightening, stopping any other words from slipping through her lips. Her jaw fell slack, her stomach dropping to the muddy ground beneath her. She tried to force the words out but she couldn't, the panic swelling in her chest was too much and she choked and stuttered. Robin stiffened beside her, his grip on her hand tightening as he spoke for her.

"This is my funeral."

Regina shook her head, her words leaving her, her thoughts blending together to incoherent mush. This wasn't possible. This couldn't be happening. The horror was too much, the panic flooded her vision, blurred the world before her, pulled the air from her lungs, and for a moment she worried that she might pass out.

The other Regina was the last to place her arrow on Robin's coffin, and the crowd instantly began to thin, leaving her and the Charming's alone with their lost family member. Soon Zelena took Regina's arm and lead her away from the gloom of the cemetery. Only Emma remained, lonesome only for a moment before Hook was behind her, out of thin air it seem, Regina swore he wasn't there a moment ago, and the blonde turned and threw herself on the pirate, locking their lips quite dramatically.

"What the hell is that about?" Robin pinched his brow and darted his eyes from the couple to Regina, who simply shrugged, welcoming the distraction from the hysteria running wild inside her. The soul mates locked eyes from a moment and nodded, wordlessly deciding that it was now or never, that they needed to get out of here.

"Emma!"

"Regina?" Emma said, watching the couple sprint from behind their hiding place, and then as she looked over her friend's shoulder her face fell, eyes widening with shock. "Wait – _Robin_?"

Emma's eyes bounced back and forth between the couple and the coffin beside her, horror spreading across her face as she tried to come to her own conclusion.

"Emma stop," Regina cut in, her voice shaking despite her desperate need for composure. "It's not us, we're not-" She waved her hand towards the coffin, losing the words she needed. "We time travelled, like the two of you did. Except we're from the past."

"You time travelled forward?" Hook asked, scepticism flowing from him. "Please tell me you didn't kill an innocent babe just to see what your future has in store because-"

"Is now the time?!" Regina cut in, shooting daggers from her eyes at the pirate before turning to Emma. Her one hand shook as she pointed to the coffin while the other pressed to her stomach. "What the _hell_ happened?"

Emma bit her bottom lip, looking from Regina and Robin to Hook, and obvious guilt flooded her eyes, dragging the corners of her mouth down.

"It's a long story."

::::

"So let me get this straight: You became the Dark One, made Hook a Dark One to save his life, killed him to save everyone else, dragged all of us to the Underworld to save him _again_ , and brought the Lord of the Underworld back, so Robin could die?"

Regina's brow furrowed and eyes blazed as she stared at Emma, who kicked at the dirt beneath her nervously. "Hey, I never forced any of you to come with me! I begged you to leave!"

"Robin is _dead_ , Emma!" Regina threw her arm out towards the grave beside her, but relaxed after Robin flinched at her side. She intertwined her fingers with his and squeezed gently, rubbing circles with her thumb on the back of his hand to relax him.

"I already feel like shit Regina, you don't have to rub it in!" Emma stepped towards her friend but stopped as Hook placed his hand on her arm.

"We are going to fix this." Regina's voice wavered, her sorrow and guilt welling in the back of her throat. As much as she wanted to blame Emma, she couldn't. This was her own fault; Robin was going to die protecting her. He was going to die, giving up everything because he loved her, a fate all of her loved ones would meet, it seemed.

"Regina, you can't–"

"I am not going back knowing that _this_ is my future!" Regina screamed, and Emma coward away from her, tucking into Hook's side. Regina's eyes burned holes into the couple in front of her, and she clenched her fists at her sides to keep from lashing out at them. "Robin doesn't deserve this. Or Roland. Or the baby. Or _me_."

"Well what do you suppose we do, love?" Hook cocked an eyebrow, and it boiled Regina's fury further. He was testing her; he knew she didn't have a plan. And honestly she didn't, how could she stop this? How could she save the man she loves _and_ stop Hook from dying in the first place? She ran through the events that were yet to happen, pinpointing a moment that she could change, the moment that started all of this chaos that was yet to be.

Her eyes snapped on to Emma's and her heart sank; there was only one option.

"This all started because you were the Dark One."

"I suppose…" Emma pondered, "But someone had to be, the darkness would have destroyed everything. It would have killed you, Regina."

"Yes I'm well aware of your sacrifice, miss Swan," Regina went to roll her eyes but stopped herself – Emma had thrown herself into darkness to save her, it wasn't fair to diminish that act of bravery. Still her fear and anger were consuming her, and she had little sympathy left for the saviour. "But you can't be the Dark One, and we can't go anywhere near Camelot so Hook doesn't run into Excalibur, literally."

It was Hook's turn to roll his eyes, but Regina dismissed it, and hugged tighter to Robin, enjoying her last few moments with him for god knows how long.

"Someone has to be the Dark One, but it's not going to be you. It's going to be me."

"What?! No!" Robin grabbed Regina's shoulders and turned her to face him. His jaw was set, but his eyes pleaded to her. "You are not taking on the darkness for me. We can find another way."

"There is no other way," Regina said, taking Robin's hands from her shoulders and holding them in front of her, "I've faced my own darkness before, I'm the only one who knows what it will be like."

"Which is why you shouldn't have to," Robin argued, "Please Regina, let's think this through – "

"There's no time. We need to get back as soon as we can, we don't know what affecting the future timeline could do, if anything."

Robin's face drooped, his eyes bouncing around Regina's features, scrambling for any other way to stop this.

"I just need you to bring me back," Regina continued, turning to face Emma and Hook, "All of you. Especially Henry. He taught me to love once, he saved me from my own darkness, he can do it again."

She turned to Robin, a meek smile forced on her face as she willed the ache in her chest to subside. "I believe in all of you."

"Regina, please…" Robin lifted a hand, gently pushing her bangs behind her ears before resting his palm on her cheek. His words fell, unsure of what he was pleading for; don't do this, don't leave me, don't succumb to darkness.

Regina wrapped her arms around him, pressing her face into his neck to hide the tears welling in her eyes. "You gave your life for me in our future, now it's my turn."

They stood there holding each other, hugging as tight as they could before they would be forced to let go when Hook spoke up.

"So what's the plan exactly? Just throwing yourself into the darkness? How will we even send you back?"

"Merlin's wand," Emma said, "the one you used to get to Camelot to find me, it can probably send you back home. And you should take it with you when you take on the darkness, tuck it into your jacket, it will give you a way to get back to Storybrooke once you're…. reborn."

Emma winced at her own words, guilt crossing her face again as her eyes dropped to her feet. She knew what this darkness was like, and Regina could only imagine that it wouldn't be pretty, especially for someone as dark as the Evil Queen.

Taking a long, shaky breath, Regina nodded once and took Robin's hand.

"Let's get back home."

::::

Time dragged as they waited for the inevitable, for the possible end of Regina, and the birth of someone far worse, someone they've all yet to meet.

Emma had returned them to their own time, landing under the clock tower as Henry and Emma were waking up from their own return, courtesy of her son's newfound author abilities.

They quickly met up with the rest of their family in the Charmings' apartment, and Regina made a point of hugging everyone she saw. As Regina had leaned back from Snow's embrace the younger woman had stopped her, holding her arms as she examined her face. She scrunched her brow and narrowed her eyes, watching Regina as the wheels turned in her head. She quickly pushed out of Snow's arms and rushed to hug Charming, which she supposed was probably more alarming to Snow than any of her previous actions.

Everyone in town decided to gather at Granny's to celebrate their return home, and Regina bounced nervously in her seat in their usual corner booth, fiddling with the long wooden wand tucked securely inside her jacket as she watched the ticking of the clock. Every short second she was closer to complete and total darkness.

She couldn't do this. She wouldn't be able to control herself. She'd be the Evil Queen on overdrive, a true force to be reckoned with. She could kill everyone in sight without batting an eye. She could hurt the people she loved most, which would defeat the entire purpose of her sacrifice. Her stomach rolled and rolled as she thought of every terrible thing she was capable of. She was a monster. She couldn't do this.

But she had no other choice. Emma could never be the Dark One if Robin was to have a future, and no one else could take the burden. She'd survived darkness before; in fact she could say she was a master of it by now. She'd let it consume her once, had been more rage than anything else. But that had been her choice, and this was her choice now. She would take the darkness, but she didn't want it. She didn't want to destroy everyone, she wanted to save them.

If only hope and good intentions were enough, maybe they could all get through this alive.

::::

When an unholy screeching outside had broke through the cheerful banter that filled Granny's and the lights had began to flicker, Regina shot a glance at Robin across from her, and, as the pain in her chest tightened, she knew it was time.

They raced outside, meeting Emma, Hook, and the Charmings in the middle of the street. They watched as tendrils of black magic swirled through the wind towards them, sending sparks flying from every streetlight it passed.

Without warning Regina snatched the now blank dagger from Emma's hand and ignored her cries of protest as the darkness closed in on them.

"Regina, what are you doing?!"

She stepped forward, pushing her family back with a gentle shove of her magic and held them there, keeping them from intervening. The wind whipped violently around them, throwing Regina's dark hair in her face constantly while Snow and Emma tried to shield their eyes as they watched Regina step forward further. The air rushing past Regina's ears made it hard to hear, but she didn't miss the screams coming from the two women behind her.

"The darkness has to be tethered to someone or it will destroy everything." Regina yelled.

"And what, you're going to take it?" Emma screamed over the wind, her voice cracking and her eyes wide, the clear emerald green edged with fear.

Regina turned and locked her eyes on Emma's, but didn't say a word. She could see the recognition pass over her friend's face, and the rest of their group quickly mirrored her.

"No! Regina don't! You've worked too hard to have your happiness destroyed!"

Regina turned to Robin, his face screwed up in terror as he fought against the magic holding him in place. Despite what they'd agreed, he was still trying to stop her. His eyes were wet, and a single tear slipped over his cheek as he yelled for her not to do this. She smiled softly at him, trying to tell him how much she loved him through their eyes alone, and she hoped he could read her the way she read him.

"It'll be destroyed anyways," She screamed, "Just…. bring me back."

The darkness flew towards Regina, circling her and blocking out the world around her. All she saw was blackness, a shade so dark and empty, so void of anything, it struck terror through her core. There was no light here, there never had been, and there never would be. No light, and no hope. She could already feel herself being lost to it, it drained her of everything, joy, love, sadness, fear. All that was left was anger.

She plunged the blade into the spiralling magic, and a shock of pain shot through her arm straight to her rib cage. Her chest contracted, a white-hot burst of fire through every nerve in her body as she felt her heart stop. The blackness circled her arm, coiling down her body and swallowing her whole. The blood that had been pumping furiously through her veins only moments ago froze, and as darkness edged her vision, she looked through the thinning veins of swirling magic to see her family watching, waiting for her to vanish into nothing.

A bright flash of white cracked through the dark street, and the dagger dropped to the pavement, a loud twang cutting through the suddenly still air.

Everyone stood rooted in place, but still each of them could see the blade as it lay facing them, the name of the Dark One etched into it menacingly.

 _Regina Mills._


	2. Chapter 2

The atmosphere in Granny's Diner was dismal at best; though packed full of people, only the sound of clinking dishes and Granny's barked orders to Ruby filled the small space. Robin assumed that everyone was terrified, on the edge of their seats, waiting for all hell to break loose.

The Charming family, now one member short, sat squished together in a corner booth with Robin, all holding each other as they dwelled on their fear and misery.

Regina and Robin had sworn to each other to keep their trip to the future a secret, but Robin had to bite his tongue from spilling the whole truth to Snow and Emma as they sat together contemplating what would drive Regina to act so rashly, without warning them before she plunged herself into eternal darkness.

 _God, it's all my fault, it's all my fault, it's all my fault_. Over and over, Robin couldn't stop the endless cycle of torment that knotted his gut and stung at his eyes. There had to have been another choice, they could have found another way to save him and Hook from their fate. Of all the people to take on the darkness, it shouldn't have been Regina. He knew she was strong, but she shouldn't have to face these demons again, to relive the nightmares that wake her more often than not, that have her sobbing and screaming in her sleep.

It should have been him; he could have become the Dark One for her. He didn't have as much pain in his past and he wouldn't have been swallowed by his darkest thoughts. He could have kept her safe, but now he was powerless. He had no way of helping her; he couldn't even understand what kind of personal hell she threw herself into. For him.

"What do you think she'll be like?" Henry asked tentatively, surprising his family. He had been completely silent once he heard what his mother had done, had closed himself off from everyone for hours, staring into space as everyone talked around him. Now he wrung his hands nervously, and Robin realized how frightened the young boy might be. He may have complete faith in his mother, but he still worried about her.

"I can imagine," Snow answered, "If she's anything like the person I made her all those years ago…. She won't be happy." David tried to reassure her that it wasn't her fault, but still Snow sighed and squeezed Henry's hand, both of them wearing the same guilt stricken, painful expression. It seemed everyone was aching for Regina and the demons she was facing right now, all alone.

"Your mom's tough, kid," Emma said, taking Henry's shaking hands in her own, "She's stronger than we know, she can get through this."

"But she shouldn't have to do it alone!" Henry huffed, frustrated, and slumped in his seat, "She needs us to remind her that we love her. To help her control the darkness."

"We'll find a way to get to her," David said, faking his enthusiasm for Henry's sake, "We'll always find her."

Henry smiled sadly, the sentiment not quite meeting his eyes, before he drooped again. "We don't even know how to get to her, or where she went. And she told Robin not to go looking for her."

Robin grimaced as he remembered Regina's words _, we can't go anywhere near Camelot_ , and he'd told his love's family as much, she wouldn't want them risking their lives for her, that it would make her sacrifice pointless. He wasn't sure what Regina expected: they're the Charmings after all, and they don't leave family behind. Ever since she'd disappeared, they'd all been racking their minds for a way to bring her back, with Robin choking back his urge to stop them, to explain that they can't find her, she'll find them.

"What if she never comes back?" Henry whispered, his sorrow cracking his voice. "What if she can't?"

"She will," Robin promised, nodding as Henry's watery hazel eyes met his, "I know it."

"How can you be sure?" Henry's face softened; hope glimmering in his eyes for a brief moment before fading away. He had to tell them, Robin decided, he wasn't going to let Henry believe that he'd lost his mother forever, and besides, she wasn't exactly here to stop him.

"Because… she took the Sorcerer's wand with her."

"What?" Snow and Emma exclaimed in unison as they both narrowed their eyes at the archer.

"Why would she take the wand? Why would she have it with her in the first place?"

Henry's eyes lit up as Robin floundered for something to calm the two women burning holes into him. "So she could come back! She took it so she could come back! Right Robin?" The young boy turned to him beaming; Robin chewed his bottom lip as everyone stared at him, regret flooding him in an instant. Shit, he should not have done this.

"How would she know she needed to come back?" David asked, more accusation than question in his tone.

"She… uh…."

A burst of purple smoke blasted through the diner's front door, throwing it off its hinges, and a crack of thunder shook the building, causing everyone to lose balance and fall on to each other. The lights blinked out, and everyone was left sitting in the twilight that slipped through the open windows.

As the smoke cleared slowly, seeping into the cracks in the floor, the room fell silent, and the clicking of very high heels echoed in Robin's ears.

Regina walked to the center of the diner, pushing tables out of her way with a flick of her wrist, with a tight menacing grin stretching across her face. Her body was covered with a long billowing cloak made of black feathers, the hood draped over her head. She lifted her hands slowly, Robin noticed the large black rings that sparkled around her fingers, and she removed the hood, dropping it behind her neck. Her hair was wildly curled and tucked over one shoulder, long enough to hang down to her belly button, which Robin realized was exposed. The dress she wore under her cloak was black silk, clinging to her curves as if it was liquid black smoke sewn together, and the neckline dropped farther than Robin had ever seen, ending just above her hip, leaving her cleavage and toned stomach on full display.

She turned slowly, her eyes raking the room until she landed on her family. Her gaze rested on Robin only for a moment before slipping to those sitting around him. Emma was the first to stand, stepping aside so her parents could follow her. Henry stayed firmly seated next to Robin, his jaw hanging slack, his eyes draining of the hope he had only moments ago. His voice wavered as he whispered a meek "Mom?"

Snow and Emma stepped in front of their family, followed closely by David and Hook. Regina ran her eyes up and down the women before her, fluttering her dramatically long eyelashes, and leaned back on her heels to let a wicked laugh rip out of her throat, sending ice down Robin's veins.

"You know, for a moment I wasn't going to come back to this hell hole, I had the whole realm to myself without all of you idiots cluttering it up. But then I got to thinking," she flourished her hand dramatically, a light airy tone filling her voice, something more terrifying than the deep growl that was escaping her lips only moments ago, "what's the fun in letting everyone who destroyed my life live on here, while I'm alone there? When I could just come back, and kill you all one by one."

Henry gasped beside Robin as Regina walked around the diner, laughing to herself as everyone coward from her. Robin slid from his seat to stand behind the Charmings, Emma, and Hook. He cautiously stepped past them, trying to get closer to Regina, to get her attention before she did something rash. She needed to remember why she did this, that her good intentions couldn't be overshadowed by the darkness now burning inside of her.

"What happened to you?" Emma asked, no delicacy in her tone, and Robin cursed her silently. Regina froze in her tracks and whipped towards Emma, her playful smile dropping to something predatory, as if she was going to growl at her. Oddly Regina turned her head to the side as if she'd heard something, looking beside her and listening before shaking her head and throwing up an impish smirk again.

"So who has my wonderful new dagger?" Regina glanced around the room, cocking her chin up regally. "Oh wait, let me guess… Emma!" She pointed at the blonde, who narrowed her eyes in disgust.

"Don't look at me like that, I know you have it. You're the only one who wouldn't give it to me." Regina raised an eyebrow and grinned menacingly, stalking towards Emma until they were almost nose-to-nose, flourishing her long cloak behind her. She noticed Hook move closer to Emma's side, as if to remind Regina that she would deal with him if she did anything to his girlfriend, and the idea made her laugh. She continued to smile as she looked Emma up and down, waiting.

"I'm not giving it to you, Regina," Emma spat, holding her ground as Regina leaned closer, her smile dropping to something far more terrifying.

"I'm not asking dear, give it to me. Now."

"I'd like to see you try and take it from me," Emma said defiantly, and Regina stepped back, a coy smile on her face again as she laughed.

"Oh miss Swan, I'm not in the mood for games. I'll take my dagger, or I'll take something else."

"What are you going to do, kill me? In front of Henry?" At the mention of his name Regina's eyes flickered between Emma and Hook's shoulders to her son before dropping to the ground as she chewed on her lower lip. Robin could see that she was ashamed to look at him, to let him see her like this, but she ignored her pain for the moment.

"Well, I can't take your heart… but I can take Captain Guyliner's." She plunged her hand into Hook's chest as a chorus of shock sounded around her. Hook grunted as the air flew from his lungs, and as she ripped her hand back, his red and black heart firmly in her grasp, he leaned over and placed a hand to his chest.

"Now there are three choices. One, you give me my dagger and you can have your boy toy's heart back. Two," Regina paused and raked her eyes along Hook's crumpled form, "I leave, and the pirate becomes my new play thing."

"I'd rather die," Hook spat.

"Oh good! That's option three."

Regina's fingers clenched around the glowing heart in her hand and Hook gasped and hissed through his teeth as he clutched at his chest.

"Regina, stop!" Emma yelled, holding Hook's shoulder as her eyes pleaded with the woman holding his heart.

"I don't have time for your stupidity, Swan, give me my dagger!" Regina raised her voice, squeezing harder and harder, and Robin could swear he heard a crack from the beating organ in his love's hand. Hook cried out in agony as Emma stood and reached into her jacket.

"Fine!" She slammed the dagger onto the diner floor, dropping to her knees next to the pirate while he caught his breath. Regina's focus flew to the blade on the floor and her fingers relaxed, letting the heart drop to the ground in front of Hook.

Robin stepped closer and looked around the couple kneeling together, pushing the pirate's heart back into his chest, and shifted closer to Regina. She stared at the ground, her eyes wide as she bent over. She lifted the blade and her hands began to tremble. Robin couldn't quite see her face behind her wild mane of hair, but she looked devastated. Her eyes were glued to her own name and her jaw hung slack. A single tear trailed down her cheek, falling onto the dagger, and she wrapped her fingers around her name firmly, without any reaction to the blood that spilled from her tight grip on the blade.

"So what now, Regina?" Snow asked firmly.

Regina cleared her throat and slipped her mask back on, turning to look back at her family as she locked eyes with Henry. Robin hadn't noticed him stand up behind him, and he'd inched his way closer to his mother. They mirrored each other, both horrified and wounded.

"Henry…" She whispered, stepping towards her son. She reached a hand out, either to brush his hair or stroke his cheek, Robin couldn't tell, but Henry swatted it away. Regina gasped as his hand hit hers, and she stared at her open palm before clenching it into a fist as her stone face cracked for an instant.

Regina's eyes flared as she turned back to the blonde crouched next to Hook.

"You did this," she spat venomously, "You took him away from me. You turned him against me."

Emma stood quickly, too quickly Robin realized, that it hadn't been Emma at all, but Regina's magic forcing her to her feet. Regina shoved her hand forward and Emma flew to the wall behind her, smashing her back into the tile with a crack and a loud cry.

"Mom stop!" Henry screamed, and Regina froze, her hand clenched in the air next to her face. "This isn't you! Why are you doing this?"

Regina dropped her hand and Emma collapsed to the ground, choking and gasping as Snow and David ran over to her. Regina forced her scowl to soften as she faced her son, but her eyes still blazed with all the fury of hell.

"They've all destroyed me time and again, and now they're about to be punished."

Henry stuttered as his eyes danced across his mother's face, his words stuck on the tip of his tongue. Robin moved to the boy's side and placed his hand on his back softly. Regina's gaze flickered to him, a flash of betrayal on her face for only a moment before Emma stood and closed in on her again.

"We're not taking any of your crap, Regina. We're not scared of you."

"Oh," Regina chuckled, gliding up to Emma as her red lips spread into a vicious grin, "But you should be, Saviour. I'm not the mayor; I'm not even the Evil Queen. I'm the Dark One, thanks to you." Something cracked Regina's smooth smile, a flicker of pain across her regal features before she composed herself again. "And you have no idea what I'm capable of."

Emma glared as Regina's head jerked to the side, and she growled a firm "shut the hell up."

Everyone stopped to look at each other before following Regina's gaze to an empty seat behind her. She was focused on the vacant seat, breathing raggedly and scowling.

"Who are you talking to, love?" Robin asked, low and quite, afraid to spook her.

"What are you talking about?" Regina turned to Robin and pointed behind her. "Rumple!" She stared at him, waiting for him to understand, but as he looked between his soul mate and the empty chair she pointed to, he slowly shook his head. She furrowed her brow and looked to the rest of her family, reading the same confusion on each of their faces. Her eyes widened, sudden horror replacing her fury. "You can't see him?"

She whipped back to the empty chair and kicked her leg out, throwing the chair across the room with a loud crash. Her hands started shaking violently, the dagger clutched so firmly her knuckles turned white. "He- He's in my head?"

Robin reached out, grazing his fingers on her sleeve before she yanked her arm away and stepped back quickly, her hands trembling as she clutched the dagger to her chest. He dropped his hand, wounded by her rejection, and wrapped his arm around Henry's shoulders as Regina retreated further, distancing herself from her family as panic took over her.

"I spent my entire life with Rumple in my head, I don't need it now!"

Without warning she ran out the door, her cloak flying behind her as she disappeared in a cloud of purple. Robin chased after her, the Charmings close behind him, and as he stepped onto the street he saw Regina appear in front of Gold's shop, pausing long enough to kick the door in and storm inside.

Robin raced down the street, reaching the pawnshop in time to hear Regina throwing and smashing anything she could find. Shards of glass and broken magical objects littered the ground, and Regina pushed a counter out of her way as she stalked to the back room.

"You son of a bitch!" Regina shrieked as Robin found her standing above a comatose Rumple, lying helplessly on a cot in his office. Regina tucked her dagger into her cloak and grabbed Rumple's jacket, shaking him violently as she screamed at him. "Wake up! This is your fault! You made me like this!"

"Regina, stop!" Robin thought to reach out to her but stopped, afraid of pushing her to withdraw from him again. "Rumplestiltskin can't do anything, he's been like this since you left."

"He's in my head. He's everywhere." Regina's voice shook, her eyes burning behind the tears that threatened to spill down her cheeks.

"It's not real," he stepped closer, drawing her attention from the man lying beneath them, "He can't hurt you."

Regina's chin quivered as she steadied her breathing, her eyes looking over Robin's shoulder to her family behind him. She hid no pain from them, her sorrow clear on her face, in her posture, in her ragged breathing, in the tears sparkling in her eyes. Her gaze rested on Snow, who was hugging Henry in the office doorway, before falling to the floor.

"He already hurt me."

She waved her hands in front of her, and in a puff of smoke she was gone.

:::

Robin walked slowly, the echo of his shoes on pavement sounded rhythmic and numbing as fear and confusion weighed down every step.

He'd spent the night at the Charmings' loft, crashing on their couch in hopes to keep an eye on Henry, knowing it would be what Regina would want. He rose before the sun, as always, and snuck out of the apartment as daylight broke over the quaint houses of the neighbourhood. He stuffed his hands in his pockets, the morning air brisk and damp as the wind rolled off the sea just a few blocks away, and he lost himself in his thoughts as he meandered down the sidewalk, his feet carrying him by memory.

Henry had sealed himself off again, ever Regina's son, as he boiled in a mix of anger and sorrow. Robin wanted to help the boy, to remind him that Regina needed him, but he refused to speak to anyone, hiding away in his grandparent's bedroom. _That's not my mom_ , he'd said meekly when Snow had tried to talk to him. Robin had imagined that getting him to help find his mother was pointless.

Snow and Emma mirrored each other, always the heroes in a time of crisis. They appeared the most level headed amongst the group, though Robin could see their pain as they had come to terms with what this new Dark One meant to Storybrooke. Everyone in this town had a past with the Queen that brought them here, trapping them for 28 years to live out their supposed eternal misery, and now that the Dark One embodied the great and terrible Evil Queen, anyone was a target. It seemed an unspoken resolution that Emma and Snow would be the first on Regina's hit list, and tension amongst the small family was evident. The Dark Curse seemed like a breeze compared to anything Regina might do now.

Charming and Hook were certainly no help, both at a loss for how they could defeat this kind of villain, one they didn't _want_ to defeat. Hook had taken his chance to make his snarky comments about his past quests to destroy the Dark One – thankfully with Henry out of ear shot – and Snow had reminded him that if they were to win this fight, Regina would lose.

So, in the end, Robin decided that he needed to be the one to find Regina first. He wanted to see if there was still a piece of her left, so he could bring her back to herself as soon as possible. He wanted to prove to everyone that she was still Regina, that she wasn't swallowed by darkness, but perhaps it was too late.

He knew that, no matter how much he loved Regina, only Henry could pull her back from this hell. She needed him and his unyielding faith, but he was only a boy, and he needed time to adjust, to see that his mother was still there. They needed each other, and yet neither could be what the other relied on now.

He approached the white mansion and halted at the bushes that circled the yard. She wasn't in her vault, and he'd checked around the forest last night before returning to the Charmings' place, but her hiding out in her own home seemed too easy. Still, he was out of options, and he wanted his Regina back, so he trudged up to the door, urging the knot in his stomach to subside. There was no reason to be afraid.

He inhaled deeply and rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans, mustering any courage he had left to simply knock on the door. What if she rejected him? What if she didn't want him? What if she was standing in her living room brewing up a dark curse to kill every person in Storybrooke? No, he had faith in her. She wasn't _that_ different. Sure she was angry, and in pain, and had Rumplestiltskin following her around everywhere she went….

He shook his head. _No, she was fine._ He lifted his hand, but before he could connect his knuckles with the door it swung open, cracking into the wall of the small foyer. _She'll regret that later,_ he mused, crossing the threshold and scanning the empty doorway for any sign of her.

He walked up the front steps, briefly considering removing his shoes out of habit, but decided that if Regina was slamming doors into walls, she wouldn't mind his shoes trailing dirt into her home.

It didn't take much to find her; she sat on the dining room table waiting for him, leaning back on her hands, her legs crossed and her chin lowered suggestively. Despite the dramatic – and ungodly sexy – dress that clung to her body, or the wild and erratic hair, it was her eyes that were the most noticeably different thing about her. The warm brown seemed to swirl with darkness, any emotions inside her stirred in those whiskey irises, dripping from the theatrically long eyelashes.

He stepped closer, hesitating as he waited for her to make the first move. She took him in, watching each of his measured steps, as she seemed to think about how to respond to him. For a moment she dropped her theatrics and smiled deeply at him, the way she had before, that honest, true smile that he had dreamed of every night away from her.

She launched off the table and threw herself on him, her weight knocking him off balance and he stepped back to catch her. She hugged him tight and he buried his face in her long hair. He'd been unsure when he'd get to hold her again, to tell her he loved her, to breathe her scent of apples and vanilla and Regina, and he certainly wasn't complaining that it was so soon.

"I missed you, love," he whispered, and she choked out a laugh.

"It worked, you're safe."

"You shouldn't have done this," he leaned back, placing his palms on her cheeks, "There had to have been another way."

She squinted her eyes and tilted her head slightly, almost offended by his choice of words. "You don't think I'm strong enough to do this?"

"No, it's not that – you shouldn't have to," He tried softly, kissing her nose when her face softened, "This isn't fair to you."

"Life isn't fair," she said flatly, "But it's worth it to protect you."

She was right; life wasn't fair, not for her, and she'd learned that long ago. She'd lost too much, felt the brunt of heroism time and time again, and he blamed himself for most of it. For as long as she'd known him, she'd been struggling to make the right choices, to correct her past sins, and all he'd done is caused her pain. First with Marian, then with Zelena and their coming baby, and even when they overcame all of that, she had still been destined to lose him.

Her fate was pain, and she didn't deserve this. She was willing to throw herself into darkness to save him, to save everyone, and yet she was destined to suffer because of it.

She was always saving him, always saving everyone, and now it was his turn.

"You don't have to do this alone," Robin said, running his thumb along her cheek.

"It's my burden to bear, not yours." Regina replied firmly, clenching her fingers in the front of his jacket.

"It doesn't have to be." He placed his fingers under her chin when she moved to object, raising his eyebrows at her. "Hey, listen to me. You can control this, you can be yourself again."

Regina's eyes left his face, focusing on the air between them, and she slowly shook her head, closing her eyes to reveal the smoky makeup covering her lids. "That doesn't seem possible."

"Trust me." He smiled gently, taking her hands in his and squeezing lightly. "One small step at a time. And I can think of a first step."

She flashed her eyes and cocked a brow, her gaze dropping to her own side, her hand sliding inside her cloak before something indistinguishable crossed her face; a mix of anger, shock, and betrayal.

"Not you, too," she drew back from him, throwing his hand out of hers as she glared at him, "I thought…"

She shook her head in utter disbelief, and for a moment he was lost, how had he screwed up so quickly? _Her dagger_. Shit, she thought he was asking her to give it to him, that he might want to control her.

"No, no, Regina, you're…." His eyes dropped to her scantily clad form before bouncing back up to her eyes. "Please, you have to believe me. I'd never… I meant…" He waved his hands in front of him, trying to choose his words delicately while she watched him floundering.

She inhaled quickly as she realized what he was thinking. "Oh." Stepping back, she flicked her wrists in front of her, encircling herself in a purple cloud. Regina stood before him wearing a mayor-approved form fitting red dress, her hair shorter, bobbing just past her shoulders, and far straighter and tamed than before. She smiled softly and shook her head gently.

"I'm sorry. I should have trusted you. Better?" She winked at him, and draped her arms around his neck.

"What are you doing here?" He wrapped his arms around her waist, and didn't miss the way she wriggled her hips in his grasp. "Come back to your family."

"You mean the bastards who ruined my life?" Regina rolled her eyes. "Not likely."

"It's not like that, they're your friends."

"They're not, they've brought me nothing but misery."

"That's the darkness talking, Regina. Not you."

Regina's eyes shot to the side, and she shifted her weight awkwardly, glaring over her own shoulder.

"He's here, isn't he? Rumplestiltskin?"

Regina didn't answer, her eyes darting between him and the apparition that was beside her. Robin placed his hands on her cheeks and drew her gaze back to him. "He's not real, don't listen to him. It's just you and me."

"Everything he says is right," she growled, yanking her face from his grasp, "They ruin everything. They never believe in me."

So the Dark One was whispering in her ear, feeding on her agony, urging her to follow her darkest impulses. _Classic Rumple_ , Robin thought, _manipulative bastard_.

He took her hand again, holding it against his heart gently. "What about Henry?"

Shame replaced her anger and she slid her hand down his chest, dropping it at her side hopelessly. "He…. He can't see me like this. I'm not good for him."

"Regina you need him. He believes in you." Robin's gut pinched at his minor lie – Henry didn't believe right now, but Regina didn't need to know about her son's wavering faith. He rubbed his hands along her arms, praying she didn't notice his slip up. "What about me?"

"It's different now- I'm different." She sighed and raked her hands through her hair in frustration. "I'm not this heroine woman you fell in love with, I don't know if I ever was. Life's too complicated for that." Hope drained from her eyes as her shoulders slumped, defeat tugging the corners of her lips down. "I'd understand if you wanted to leave, I'm… I'm not-"

Robin shook his head once and rested his hands on the dip of her shoulders. "I'm with you, always."

He pulled her closer and pressed a gentle kiss to her cheek. As he pulled back he found her smiling, real, pure happiness shining inside her again. "You still think… We might… have a future together?"

"Doubt never crossed my mind. Dark One or not, you are my future, Regina."

She grinned and pulled him into her, hugging him fiercely as she choked back a sob. They laughed quietly together, holding each other as if for the first time, Robin looping his fingers in her hair while Regina slipped her hands under his jacket, running her palms along his lower back.

They separated only briefly, pressing their foreheads together as they shut their eyes, closing the world off. It was just them, and together they could take on anything.

 _She can do this,_ he realized, pride blooming inside of him so quickly he threatened to burst, _if anyone can do this, it's her._

He lifted his head to look into her eyes, and he risked stealing a kiss from her. He pressed his lips to hers softly, meaning for it to only be a peck before she roped her arms around his neck and pulled him in further, locking his lips with hers.

A fire lit between them, sparking every nerve in Robin's body as she pressed her chest to his, kissing him hard and stirring something in his belly. She grabbed the front of his jacket and yanked him back, crashing her own back into the wall behind her, pinning herself under him. He rocked into her, pressing his thigh between her legs as she slid her tongue into his mouth.

Robin couldn't tell how long they stayed like this, making out like horny teenagers against her dining room wall, but he was fully lost in the feel of her soft skin under his palms, the taste of her neck when he ran his tongue from her clavicle to the hinge of her jaw, the sound of her moans as she rocked her hips against his thigh, when his cellphone erupted in his jacket pocket.

"Fuck," he hissed into her neck before he leaned back, grabbing the phone and reading the name on the screen. "It's David, they're probably wondering where I went."

Robin groaned as Regina gently pushed him off of her, releasing his leg from between her thighs, and she gave him a playful smile as she reached up to fix his hair, now dishevelled from her running her fingers through it. "You should go back," she said, pressing a quick kiss to his lips, one he tried to pull her into before she smiled and leaned back, "Make sure Henry's okay for me."

"You can come with me, you know," Robin reminded her, "They want to see you."

She grimaced and slid her hand into his, pulling him towards the door gently. "No they don't."

He wanted to protest, to tell her they really did want her back, but he supposed he didn't know what they wanted. He trusted her completely, but perhaps her family had different opinions of the new Dark One; maybe they would only accept the old Regina. He stumbled over his words as she lead him down the stairs, and she shook her head and pressed her palm to his cheek.

"Just promise me you'll come back."

Robin took one last look at Regina, her face vulnerable yet more confident than it had been when he arrived, and he comforted himself in her strength, knowing that he could leave and she would be fine. He leaned forward to steal one last kiss, letting his lips linger on hers, committing the taste of her lips to memory, before she shoved him playfully out the door.

"I'll be back as soon as I can."


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Please note that the rating of this fic is officially changing from T to M. That's right kids, it's getting hella smutty._

* * *

"Where the hell have you been?!" Emma demanded as Robin pushed through the door to the loft. He turned to close the door behind him and took in the room, noticing every adult's eyes on him – a brief flicker of concern for Henry's whereabouts flashed in his gut – before he played up a nonchalant shrug.

"Out."

"Oh for the love of God, Robin," Emma rolled her eyes, "We told you not to go looking for Regina alone!"

"You don't know if I was with Regina!" He defended as Snow stepped over to hand him a coffee, a slight peace offering in the potential war that was going to take place in her kitchen. Before turning away, she placed a hand on his arm delicately.

"I don't think you left wearing lipstick," she whispered before slipping back to her place at David's side.

A flash of irritation filled Robin's gut as he wiped at his mouth and rolled his eyes, confessing that yes, he found Regina.

"And?" David asked, raising his eyebrows expectantly.

All eyes were on Robin, waiting impatiently as he drummed his fingers on the mug tucked into his hands. Should he tell them the truth? What even _was_ the truth? Yes Regina seemed in control, though she was sporting a little more bloodlust than normal, but would that satisfy the Charmings? Would they accept that she was struggling? For God sake it had only been a day, after all. They couldn't expect her to conquer the darkness in less than 24 hours, could they?

"She's… fine." He shrugged again, taking a long pull from his mug as he tried to fight against the frustration welling inside him. "As fine as she can be, I suppose."

"That's all you're giving us?" Emma narrowed her eyes and tilted her head. "You found time to suck the lipstick off of her face, and all you'll say is she's _fine_?"

"I don't know what you want me to say," Robin raised his voice, clenching his fist at his side, "She's not exactly pissing rainbows and sunshine right now."

"We're worried about her!" Emma shouted, and she leaned across the counter and glared at Robin. "She can't be doing well on her own, and if all you're doing is sneaking out to swap spit-"

"Oh for fuck sakes, Emma, is that all you care about?" Robin stepped closer, any composure left inside him snapping like a twig. "Do you think I don't care about her? That I'm not supporting her _properly_?"

"Well I don't know, I haven't seen anything supportive from you since we got back from Isaac's damn book!"

"And what the hell does that mean?" Robin inched closer to the counter, setting his mug on the ceramic countertop with a loud crack as he glared at the blonde across from him.

"You were awfully quiet with Regina before she just _happened_ to throw herself into the darkness for everyone," Emma spat, "And then you admit that she somehow knew to take the Sorcerer's wand with her just in time for her to jump realms on her own?"

Robin shook his head and clenched his fingers on the counter. "You don't understand-"

"What I understand is you _let_ Regina become the Dark One and you won't even tell us why!"

"She did it for me!" He yelled, his voice cracking as he smacked his palm on the counter. He exhaled loudly as silence fell across the room. Snow and David stood together, wide-eyed and silent, with Killian just a few feet away, slightly more composed than his two friends. Emma raised her eyebrows as she stared at Robin, her anger slipping into something closer to sympathy as she watched Robin's shoulders sag and his head hang.

"I didn't want her to," Robin muttered, running his hands through his hair, "We… we didn't come straight back from Isaac's alternate reality. We ended up in the future and… I was dead." His voice dropped off, the last word barely a whisper before he sighed and gripped the counter tighter, steadying himself.

Emma furrowed her brow as she dropped her shoulders, her rigid posture finally relaxing. "But… How – Why did she have to be the Dark One? What does that do?"

Robin lifted his eyes, finding fear and tension in the emerald green across from him. "Because you were suppose to be the Dark One, and I ended up dead. Along with Hook." Robin nodded to the pirate across the room, watching as horror and guilt wrestled across Emma's features. "Regina thought that she could save all of us."

They stood sombrely for a moment, Emma's eyes bouncing between Killian's confused gaze and Robin's defeated one. He could read a million emotions running through Emma's mind, flooding her eyes and twitching at her lips: agony, fear, guilt, relief, sorrow, to name a few. For someone so often composed, Robin found that the saviour was quite the open book.

A creek in the floorboards had everyone in the room jump, turning to find Henry standing on the stairs, his body heaving with sleep while his eyes were alert with fear.

"She sacrificed herself for all of you." His words were more of a statement than a question, but Robin nodded his head nonetheless. He chewed the inside of his cheek absently as his guilt gnawed at him relentlessly. In the end, it was only Robin who hadn't made it out of Emma's moment as the Dark One. Regina had saved him alone. Though, he supposed she did save the rest of her family from a dark Swan and a hellish trip to the Underworld. She deserved credit for that.

"How was she? Really?" Snow asked gently, frowning at Robin from across the kitchen.

"She… she's struggling. She's angry, but it's more than that. It's… it's not her. It's like the darkness is sucking her down from the inside, like she's burning inside. But she's hiding it."

"Classic Regina," David mumbled.

"No, this is different," Robin snapped, unwelcoming the other man's usual disapproval of his soul mate. "Regina knows anger but this… this is just destruction. This is a suffocating pain."

"So what do we do?" Emma questioned, setting her features to something more determined than broken, though it did little to hide her pain.

"We need to get through to her." Robin sighed and rubbed his eyes, pushing at the ache that was growing in the front of his skull.

"What about her dagger?" Hook suggested, "If we take it away from her we can stop her from hurting anyone."

"Not likely. She'll have it glued to her hip or hidden completely out of reach," Emma answered.

"Wait, wait, stop." Henry finished his decent down the stairs and approached the group. "Are you actually considering controlling her? Is betraying her the best thing you can come up with?" He looked to each of his family members, disgust and disappointment dripping like acid from the young boy's eyes, ever Regina's son.

"That's sure to quench the bloodlust," Robin quipped, met by a roll of the eyes from Emma.

"Well what do _you_ suggest?"

"We need to get through to her. To talk to her."

"Talking isn't enough," Emma groaned, "She may be okay with you, but she hates us."

"We're _not_ controlling her," Robin said sternly, flashing his eyes to the blonde to tell her he wasn't bending on that rule.

"We won't control her, we could just remove the dagger, take away her chance to use it." Emma shrugged, as if it was the simplest suggestion in the world. Robin clenched his jaw and scoffed. Regina would be livid if anyone took her dagger, good intentions or not, and it would surely get them all roasted alive.

"She'll never let us near her dagger," Robin tried to reason.

"I doubt she still has it with her," Snow piped up, "She probably felt safer hiding it. I can't imagine she likes looking at it." Snow seemed to repress a shiver, and the corners of her mouth fell.

"So we need someone to find out where it is," David added, "And the rest of us can find it."

All eyes turned to Robin, and he growled his annoyance. "No."

"She trusts you!" Emma tried. "She already let you in once, just try to figure out where she put it, get her to mention it, that's all."

Robin bit his tongue as his stomach rolled. He couldn't persuade them away from this hellish idea, though he could see some light at the end of the tunnel. He knew Regina was strong, but she couldn't fight the darkness alone – though she might be convinced otherwise – and this could be his way of helping her. If he took away her temptation, perhaps she could see that their intentions were for her benefit.

"If she finds out what I'm doing, she'll kill me." Robin sighed, unsure if his words were literal or figurative. She'd surely have no problem killing Emma or Snow, but if he broke her heart enough, he'd certainly be the next one charred to a crisp.

"Then don't let her find out." Emma raised her brow and nodded once, sealing the plan – the horrible, awful, deceitful plan.

"If she catches me," Robin continued, "She'll need someone else to calm her down." Robin turned to Henry, making every effort to beam at the boy, though he could tell his smile came off as more of a grimace.

"I… I don't know if I can do it." Henry shook his head and fiddled with his shirt buttons absently.

"She needs you Henry, you believe in her in a way no one else does." Robin stepped closer, rested a hand on his arm, and gave him an honest smile. He trusted Henry to help Regina, and he wanted him to understand that there were people who believed in him, too.

Henry chewed his bottom lip – another sign of Regina, making Robin's heart jump at the similarity to his mother – and stared at the ground before looking up at Robin.

"I don't think she needs me right now, not yet. I think she needs you."

:::

 _He said he was coming back._

 _He's never coming back, you fool._

 _Shut up, he wouldn't lie to me._

 _And why not? Because he_ loves _you?_

Regina rolled across her bed, gripping the pillow behind her and hurling it across the room, watching as it hit the far wall with a dull thud and slid to the floor.

"Your aim isn't the only thing that's pathetic," Rumple – or rather the illusion of Rumple – snickered from the dark corner of Regina's bedroom. She groaned loudly as she pressed her other pillow over her head, burying her face in her chilled sheets. The room was dark and, for the most part, silent; moonlight filtered through the sheer curtains and cast a subtle glow across the blankets that were strewn haphazardly across the bed. Regina had been tossing and turning relentlessly for hours, kicking the covers off when they tangled around her ankles.

"For the love of God, shut up!"

She'd thought she was exhausted; after one of the longest days she had in ages she was ready to collapse as soon as she'd closed the door behind Robin. She hadn't slept a wink the night before, unintentionally, as she'd locked herself away in her vault, hunched over every book she could find that had any information on the life of the Dark One.

She poured herself into every word she could find, desperate for a way to tear the voices out of her head to no avail. Her heart sank as each new passage told her nothing of value, no written words came from the Dark One themselves, and everything hinted towards assumption rather than fact. She'd grown frustrated and threw every useless book across her vault, scattering page after page of useless information.

After years of studying under Rumple, he'd never given her an inkling of what it was like to be the Dark One. Dark magic, sure, but that could be taught to anyone with the right amount of fire burning in their veins. But this, this was a whole new world of fire, a constant burning below her skin, every nerve exposed and raw.

Controlling her rage was a growing concern, as she found herself throwing everything in arms reach across the room, shattering vials and boxes against the stone walls, screams ripping through her throat as she seethed with unquenchable anger.

She felt… lost. Every emotion that boiled under the surface felt out of place and set her on edge, uncontrollable waves rose from her gut and filled her with random bouts of fury, and she hated it. No, she _loathed_ it. She didn't want to feel this way, as if she was fighting a storming sea, being tossed around in her own fear and hatred and trying desperately not to drown. But her mind fought her; darkness pulled her under over and over, drenching her in her own agony, filling her lungs with such burning hatred for everything and anything that her hands constantly burned with the fire that begged to ball in her palms.

She'd hoped to lock herself away, to try to control the demons that were running wild inside her, and she'd left her vault as dawn broke through the sparse gray clouds, retreating to her empty house only to feel her heart clench as she realized that she may never come home to another person again.

Before long Robin showed up, and she welcomed the distraction from her own inner turmoil, however brief it was. He'd sparked hope inside her, something she feared would never return after she'd plunged her dagger into the swirling darkness. But of course it had. Robin always found hope for her, so full of it himself he couldn't help but rub off on her. His unyielding faith in her bloomed inside her heart, and as she'd watched him walk down her porch to return to the Charmings, she clung to his faith in her. For now, it was all she had.

Or so it had been. She hadn't heard a word from him since he'd left, and with each ticking hour she grew lonesome, fighting against the blooming panic in the back of her mind. He wouldn't lie to her, he would be back, she was certain. Though the darkest parts of her told her other wise, over and over, again and again, that he would betray her, love would always betray her.

Finally she'd decided to rest, in hopes that she could wake up to him knocking on her door, or better yet, him crawling into her bed as he so often did when he was working late during those few precious moments of normalcy they had found between the constant chaos. So she'd drawn the curtains and crawled under her covers, rolling herself into a cocoon of warmth as she waited for her exhaustion to pull at her eyelids and let her slip into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Her expectations, it seemed, had been terribly false as she rolled again, splaying her limbs out in an attempt to find any position that was comfortable enough to let her lull herself to sleep. Though who could sleep with an infuriating imp chattering constantly in the back of your mind?

"And here I thought you'd figure it out by now," Rumple giggled from his corner, "Who knew you were so slow."

"What are you talking about?" Regina groaned into her pillow, moving her legs again, stretching one out as she pulled the other up and in, cuddling her bunched up blankets as she would another person – God why wasn't Robin there yet?

"You'll never fall asleep, dearie," Rumple sighed, his tone disapproving as if he was talking to a petulant child – how he'd talked to her for years when she couldn't master _the simplest of spells._

"Not with you yapping in my ear all night," Regina spat as she squeezed the pillow against her ears and pressed her eyes shut. She just needed to ignore him, if he'd go away maybe she could let her mind go blank enough to hopefully find some rest.

"You seem to need me to spell it out for you," his voice came from directly beside her bed and Regina jumped, throwing her pillow out at Rumple's hunched over form. He punctuated each word with a dramatic flare as he leaned in close to her, his nose almost brushing against hers, "Dark. Ones. Don't. Sleep."

Her face fell as he leaned away, giggling furiously to himself. "Ever?" Her voice was meek and defeated, and she looked up to him expectantly, her heart sinking as he shook his head before flicking his wavy hair out of his face.

"And here I thought I could escape you for a moment," She threw her last pillow at Rumple and sat up, clenching her fists in the wrinkled quilt tangled in her legs.

"You just need a hobby." Rumple drummed his fingers together and puckered his lips. "Perhaps scrapbooking? You can record every terrible memory you have with the people who you think care about you."

Regina rolled her eyes and slid back to rest against her headboard. She leaned back, crossing her arms across her chest and squeezed, hugging herself tightly.

"This is your chance, dearie," Rumple started excitedly, "You have all the time in the world to plot your revenge."

"I don't want revenge," Regina said almost automatically. She'd been drilling it into her own mind for hours, trying to quell the thirst for blood that lingered in the back of her mind.

"Oh, you and I both know that's not true. I can feel it boiling inside you…" He stepped closer, pointing a long dirty finger at Regina's chest, "Churning deep in your soul, waiting to be unleashed. You want blood, you want revenge for everything they did to you."

Regina's heart pounded in her chest, and she gritted her teeth as she told herself he was wrong.

"You deserve your own happiness, after all," He continued, stepping closer still, drawing her attention to him, "You didn't deserve this life. They destroyed you."

"You're wrong," She hissed through her teeth as her throat tightened and her soul burned. She clenched her fists, digging her nails into her palm, focusing on the stinging as she broke her skin. Her chest contracted as a pressure grew inside her, pressing on her lungs, her stomach, her throat, making her see red.

"Don't you want your happiness?" Rumple asked, his tone more mocking than anything resembling sincerity. "Don't they deserve to be punished for everything they took from you?"

 _They took everything from me. My hope. My freedom. My future. My love. Daniel. Henry. Even Robin…_

"You know, deep down inside," Rumple's voice lowered as he closed in on her, pressing his boney finger into the top of her sternum, "This wasn't supposed to be your life. You didn't deserve this. But they do."

 _They deserve this. They deserve to suffer as I have. All of them will know what they did to me. Snow, Charming, Hook, Emma…_

"Henry…" Her thoughts slipped through her lips, her voice cracking from the tension building inside of her. "I can't do anything without losing Henry."

A sly grin spread across Rumple's face, revealing his yellowed teeth, and he giggled as he stepped back from her, pacing long circles in front of her bed. "What if I told you there was a way for you to get everything you want; your revenge _and_ your son?"

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"It's all a matter of utilizing the darkness, dearie."

"No," Regina cut in firmly, "I'm not doing what Hook did - I'm not releasing all of the Dark Ones. It could end the same way it did the first time, and I'm not losing Robin."

"I'm not sure why you care so much," Rumple said as he scrunched his nose in disgust, "The petty thief who smells like forest? Surely you can do better."

Regina clenched her jaw and flexed her fingers as Rumple continued, "Besides, didn't he move on with your sister? They're expecting a baby, are they not?" Regina shot him a warning glance, but her stomach clenched as yet another betrayal stabbed her deep in her gut. "Doesn't sound like someone worth sacrificing your life for."

"That's not Robin's fault, that's Zelena's."

"We're getting off track here." Rumple waved his hands in frustration before inhaling slowly. "You need to rid the town of the pesky heroes. One. By. One."

Regina stared at Rumple and her breathing slowed as her eyes glazed over, losing herself in flashing thoughts of anger and pain, of endless possibilities for every one of the people who did her wrong. She could feel herself slipping into the darkness that swirled inside of her, filling her with burning hatred, and she focused on Rumple as her gaze darkened.

"What must I do?"

Rumple's lips spread into a wide grin, a slight twinkle shining from his eyes in the darkness of the bedroom. "Show them what they did to you. Show this town that they're not really heroes."

:::

For the second time today, Robin found himself standing on Regina's doorstep with his stomach in knots. He was quickly growing accustomed to living in a state of constant unease, and the thought of it never going away only twisted his insides further.

He was late, incredibly so. The sun had set several hours ago and the moonlight glowing overhead was the only source of light on Regina's front steps. He should have left earlier, if only the Charmings would have let him. For people so insistent on his betrayal of the woman he loved, they certainly didn't want to return him to her.

They'd spent several hours dissecting how Robin should get the dagger's whereabouts out of Regina, looping in endless circles of "just ask her" and "make it subtle". By the time the sun had began to set, they realized that hadn't eaten a bite, which was contributing to the pounding behind Robin's eyes, and that he hadn't gone to see Roland for almost two days.

He was being torn apart by guilt, whether it was neglecting his son, betraying Regina, or being the source for all this upheaval of everyone's lives in the first place. He couldn't handle this torment, this never-ending ache that stabbed his heart with every passing second.

He had no choice but to make do, to put his every effort into fixing everything that he had destroyed. He'd visited Roland for dinner, while dancing around his questions of Regina and Henry, agreed to the least-damaging plan of action with Regina, and forced each shame-filled step that landed him on Regina's porch.

After he thought about it, he realised there were no lights on inside her house. The curtains were drawn, and no sound could be heard through the door. It was silent, and for a moment he wondered if she'd grown fed up and left home instead of waiting for him. Still, he had promised to come back, so he wrung his hands once and reached for the doorknob, turning it without resistance.

The inside of Regina's house was as disturbingly silent and dark as the outside, though something felt… off. The air was heavy, making it harder to breathe, and his skin flushed with goosebumps as he stepped further inside. His heart pounded in his chest, and he swallowed thickly as he moved silently upstairs. The farther he went, the worse he felt. His skin flushed with sweat as his stomach churned, the air grew cold and thick, and his breath came out in strangled wheezes as he tried to remain quiet.

Regina's bedroom door was cracked open, and the hushed sound of her voice could be heard echoing down the hall. Robin swallowed through the nausea welling in the back of his throat, and he crept closer, wishing his heart would stop pulsing in his ears so he could hear properly.

Her voice was deep and throaty, laced with venom, though hushed as it may be. Regina didn't exactly have the most high-pitched voice, but this tone she carried seemed to come from lower than her usual inflection. It sent a spike of fear down Robin's spine, and, as he neared her door, he considered getting as far away from here as possible. The air was buzzing with magic, so much so he felt like he might suffocate, and the voice on the other side of the door was something of the Evil Queen, he was sure of it.

No, she was still Regina, and she needed him. Before he could second guess himself, he knocked quickly on her door and held his breath. He must have startled her, as he noticed her voice catch and fall silent, and the thickness of the air swelled further, pushing all the air from his lungs.

He took a chance and pushed her door open, trying (and failing) to hide his gasps for air as he spied her perched on the side of her bed. She was scowling, but her face lit up when she saw him, and she pushed off the bed and ran to him. As she crashed into him, a wave of fresh air pulsed into the room, and Robin took a long shaky breath as he tried to hold her upright.

"Where were you?" She insisted, squeezing him so tight the last of his air puffed from his lungs.

"I forgot to visit Roland," he admitted, and a stab of guilt pinched his gut yet again as he used his son as an excuse. "And it seems time got away from me. I'm sorry, love."

She arched back and shook her head, beaming at him. "It's okay, I understand." Her smile faltered for a moment, and he imagined she was feeling her own pang of guilt for her absence in Henry's life. At least they had something in common, Robin mused.

"Are you okay?" Robin asked. "Something was quite… _off_ when I got here."

"Oh… uh…" Regina trailed off, her eyes bouncing around his face nervously. "I just…"

"Was it Rumplestiltskin again?" He squeezed his hands gently at her hips, and her brow cocked in mild surprise. "I could hear you talking to someone, and there was so much magic in the air I thought you were trying to kill me."

She laughed and shook her head. "Never." She smiled softly, her eyes dampening as she shook her head again. "I can't get Rumple out of my head. It's like he consumes me. I know everything he says is wrong in my heart, but it's like… my head won't listen."

"Is he here now?"

She looked around the room once, but was already breathing a soft _no_ as she did.

"Maybe we shouldn't leave you alone then, yeah? I'll stay with you to kick his ass whenever he wants to torment you."

She chuckled and lifted a hand to his cheek. "My knight in shining armour."

"Why don't you get some rest, hmm?" Robin nodded to the dishevelled bed. "You're probably stressed and exhausted."

Regina pursed her lips and frowned. "Turns out dark ones don't sleep."

"Oh…" Robin pinched his brow as he looked towards the blankets and sheets thrown about the room, noticing a pillow or two against the opposite wall. "Not without a lack of trying I see."

Regina hummed and placed a palm on the back of his neck, tugging him into a gentle kiss. As he moved back, Regina gripped his neck tighter and pulled him in longer, pressing her chest flush to his.

"Maybe you can help me relieve some stress."

Before he could register what she meant, Regina turned with Robin and pushed him backwards, knocking him down to sit on the bed. She made quick work of straddling his lap, never releasing his lips from hers. She slid her tongue along the seam of his lips, and he opened them automatically, letting her do whatever she wanted.

Shit. _Shit_. This was _not_ the way it was supposed to go. She would think he came here to seduce and distract her, that he got in her bed just to betray her. But she was sucking his neck and grinding her hips slowly, teasing, and his thoughts kept wandering to the feeling of the silk nightgown that slid under his palms as he coasted them around her rear and up to her chest.

She took control instantly, pulling at his jacket and rucking his scarf off his neck as she rotated kissing his neck, jaw, and lips. Then she tugged at the hem of his shirt, yanking the fabric harder and harder until he thought it might tear, before he pulled it over his head and threw it to the floor. She pushed him flat on his back and fumbled for the button of his jeans. The desperation in her actions dimmed the fire that had been building in his belly, and the crease in her forehead had him sitting up and taking her hands in his.

"Let me, love." He pulled at her arm and guided her to the bed, asking her to lie down for him. "You're supposed to be relaxing."

She was wound tighter than a spring, ready to snap at any moment, and it did nothing to relieve the anxiety dwelling in the back of his mind. He needed her sated enough to relax with him, to be willing to tell him where she hid her dagger, and she certainly wasn't going to loosen up with a frantic fuck. No, he needed to distract her, and as much as the deception pained him, he comforted himself with the thought that pleasuring her couldn't possibly be the worst thing he was doing lately.

Robin tugged her nightgown off slowly, letting the silk trail up her torso, a path of goosebumps rising with each inch of exposed skin. Once she lay bare before him, he leaned over and slid his tongue down her neck and across her shoulder, then down to her breast, sliding just past her already pebbled peak, and she moans her dissatisfaction as he travels down to her navel and back up. He moved agonizingly slowly until she was writhing beneath him, and he relished the moments when he found a particularly sensitive spot, on her neck, near her hip, on the inside of her thigh.

He continued like this, always avoiding her most sensitive areas until she's pleading, begging for him. He grinned into her skin when he was met by a satisfied groan as he took one nipple into his mouth and sucked hard once, releasing her breast with a pop and a smirk before moving to the other, repeating the action.

She pushes her head back into her pillow, clenching and unclenching her fists in the sheets as she whispers _harder_ , and he quickly follows her request. He sucks harder, longer, kneading her other breast with his hand while she tried desperately to find friction for the ache certainly growing between her thighs. He trailed up her neck, sucking and licking as small gasps fell from her lips, and she asks _harder_ again.

"I'll leave marks," He reminds her, and she hisses her disregard as he swirls his tongue just behind her ear.

Regina was always a stickler for marks, claiming that hickies were nothing appropriate for a mother or a mayor, but who was he to deny her what she wanted, so he sucked her skin between his teeth before quickly soothing his tongue over the red patch that bloomed along her neck.

"Please – ah!" She hissed as he tugged her nipple roughly between his teeth. " _More_ , Robin."

She snaked her fingers up and gripped his hair, pushing his head farther south, and he chuckled as he licked his way down her belly to her thighs.

"Eager, are we?" He mused, dropping delicate, teasing kissing up and down the inside of her legs.

"I've had – oh!" He sucked sharply where her leg met her hip, and she bucked encouragingly, her breath coming out in pants. "It's been a hell of a day."

 _That it has,_ he thought, and he flicked his tongue on top of her over-sensitive bud once, and she jerked her hips again, groaning in frustration. He starts slowly again, long flat licks along her sex, and then short, quick flicks on her clit. She holds nothing back, moaning and muttering above him, clenching her fingers in his hair, her hair, the sheets, anything she can dig her fingers into.

He pressed harder, alternating between sucking and lapping, and every sigh and moan escaping that gorgeous mouth goes straight to Robin's cock. She lifted her hips off the bed, grinding herself against his face as she begged for more, pleading with _yes Robin_ 's and _don't stop'_ s as her legs started to tremble.

But he does stop, and Regina growled her disappointment as he lifted himself above her, latching his mouth to a breast as he sinks two fingers into her. Her frustration melts away as he curls his fingers inside of her, pressing on the spot that gets her shaking beneath him, her mouth falling open and every ecstatic cry falls freely.

She's different tonight, Robin realized as he tried to meet her every demand. She wanted everything at once, and rough, so rough he would leave her covered in marks and surely sore in the morning. She begged for his tongue and his fingers, but she also wanted attention on her breasts, so he found himself moving in circles, sucking a nipple before sliding down to give a few laps at her clit.

It pinched his gut with guilt, it made him remember why he was doing this, and suddenly he felt dirty and wrong. He wasn't taking advantage of her, he wasn't. She wanted this, and so did he, had even wanted her when he saw her wearing the dramatically revealing dress of the Dark One.

He snapped out of his inner criticism as Regina tilted her hips and gave a small shout at the shock of new pleasure. She chewed on her lip to hold back another – something she always does, for fear of being caught by one of their children – and the knot in his stomach loosened with something so normal for her. But he needed the distraction from his disgrace, and he urged her to let go for him, not to hold back tonight.

But she doesn't groan, or shout, or even scream, she _talks_ , and it does things to him, churning low in his belly as he pushes her higher and higher towards her peak. "Yes Robin – oh – don't stop… right there – I love you… oh god… suck Robin please - ah!"

He ducked down and sucked long and hard, then short and fast, and she rolled her hips into him, panting and sweating and shaking as she lifted her hands to cup her own breasts. He pumped his fingers faster, pressing into that perfect spot again and again, harder and faster, and she's shouting above him. With one more suck she bucked her hips and arched into him, screaming her release as her pleasure rocked her from head to toe.

She didn't let him finish, let him push her for all the pleasure he could, and she grabbed his hair and tugged him up, locking her mouth to his as she rolled him over to lay on his back. So she wanted to be on top, Robin mused, and supposed it would be better for her, which in turn would be better for him.

Robin was still wearing his pants, and Regina quickly waved her hand and removed them in a cloud of purple. She took him in hand, but frowned slightly when she realized he was only half hard. _Shit_ , he was too distracted for this, too ridden with shame, and he pulled her down to kiss him again.

"What's wrong?" She asked, pinching her brow.

"Nothing, it's not you," Robin insisted, cupping her cheek gently. "It's just… a difficult day."

She frowned further before a spark lit in her eye, and she smirked smugly at him. She scooted back, dipping her mouth down to trail her tongue from his belly button to the hinge of his hip, and his nerves lit up under her touch. She slid her tongue, flat and hot, from the base of his cock to the tip slowly, and he dropped his head back into the pillow.

Regina wasted no time in teasing, and took him in her mouth slowly, first just the head, then more, and more, and met her mouth with small strokes of her hand at the base. She swirled her tongue around the tip, and god how she knows he loves that. He groaned her name and she chuckled, the vibration adding to the hot pleasure of her mouth.

Once he was finally no longer distracted and fully hard for her, he tugged her shoulders, pulling her to straddle his lap, her legs still weak from her first orgasm. He wasn't convinced he could finish, and didn't want her spending too long on a fruitless effort for him, but if he could bring her to another peak, perhaps he could blame his exhaustion and get away with it.

He lined himself up with her, and she sunk down onto him, her jaw hanging slack as she took all of him.

"Better?" She asked, grinning as she ground her hips once, lazily.

"You have no idea," he answered, suddenly breathless, "But this wasn't a-about me." He choked as she thrust her hips down hard once, twice, again, and then moved back to her slow lazy grinding. Maybe this would work after all.

"Why not?" She managed, her breath huffing out as she leaned forward to squeeze her fingers on the headboard behind Robin, a short moan slipping out as the new angle pressed her clit to him with every pass of her hips. He thrust up to meet her on her downward path and she gasped, telling him _yes again just like that._

"You need this-" He swallowed thickly, "more than I do." He gained speed slowly, each thrust coming faster and harder, releasing gasp after gasp from Regina's trembling lips. Oh this will work, this will definitely work. The sight of her writhing on top of him was enough to spark a fire burning low in his belly, and he gasped a quick "God you're beautiful – Christ, Regina," as he slipped his hand between them and pressed firmly on her clit.

"I – ah!" Regina squeezed her eyes shut as she ground her hips harder, smacking down against Robin. "I need –" Her words dropped as she clenched her teeth, breathing harshly through her nose.

"What, love?" He took her breast in his free hand, timing each squeeze and roll of her nipple with the quick thrusts of his hips. She nodded encouragingly, clenching her walls around him and making him groan loudly. "Tell me."

"Harder," she breathed, leaning forward to suck on the pulse point below his ear, rough enough to surely leave him sporting a mark that matched the one on her own neck.

"I don't want – _Gods Regina_ – to hurt you."

" _Fuck me_ ," She hissed, and Gods, he couldn't say no to that. He took both his hands and placed them on her hips, holding her firmly as he pounded into her, harder than he normally would, and she tipped her head back and shouted her approval. She met every thrust and rolled her hips against him, shouting encouragements to him over and over, _yes Robin yes don't stop don't ever stop_.

Her belly clenched as she came apart on top of him, and he held her firmly as her hips bucked with her pleasure. He slowed his thrusting when she winced above him – finally finding a point of _too_ hard – and with one, two, three thrusts he was spilling into her with a loud grunt of his own.

She collapsed on top of him, sticky and sated with his cock still buried inside of her, and for a moment they lay together, waiting for their breathing to regulate and their heartbeats to slow.

He didn't remember her getting off of him, or slipping under the covers with her, but before he could find any time to talk to her, he was falling into a deep sleep, his exhaustion dragging him from his goal of finding her dagger. But as his eyelids drooped and he pulled her close to him, breathing in the scent of her, apples and spice and sweat and sex, he supposed it might be better this way.

:::

Robin was sound asleep, his arm draped over her stomach as he snored beside Regina. She felt slightly guilty for his complete exhaustion, since she had demanded quite the exertion from him earlier. But he had met her every request, and seeing him so completely at ease with her now, so willing to give her everything she wanted, had helped to remove some of the pain in her heart.

She propped her head up and smiled down at him, swirling her fingers along his bare skin and relishing in the goosebumps that trailed her touch. If every night were like this, staring down at the man she loves while he hugged her close, perhaps not sleeping wouldn't be so terrible.

A loud buzzing from across the room woke Regina from her lovesick stupor, and she leaned over to see Robin's phone light up in his pocket, vibrating with each new text he received. Once, twice, again, whoever it was desperately wanted his attention. She glanced at him, moving slightly to test exactly how sound asleep he was, and, when he didn't stir, slid out of his loose hold on her to sneak over to the pile of clothes on the floor.

She grabbed his phone and unlocked it easily – he never saw a need for a password – and made quick work of opening his unread texts.

 **Emma: How's it going?**

 **Emma: Status report..?**

 **Emma: Robin what's going on? You've been gone forever.  
Killian: Emma's getting restless, hurry this along mate.**

 _What the hell?_ She peeked over her shoulder, taking a moment to watch Robin's chest move up and down slowly, and glared back at his phone. She ground her teeth together and clicked the keyboard of his phone.

 **Robin: What's going on with Emma?**

Seemed simple enough, she thought, and waited a few short moments for a reply, holding her breath until the phone vibrated again.

 **Killian: Good god mate, we thought she'd swallowed you whole. Found the dagger yet?**

 _WHAT?!_ Regina had to bite her tongue to hold back the scream that was building in her chest. Her jaw hung slack and she rounded on Robin, standing beside him as he snored obliviously.

He was supposed to love her, he was supposed to believe in her, but he's plotting to control her with the rest of the fucking heroes? This couldn't be happening. She loved him, she trusted him, but he was just like everyone else. He was using her, he was pretending to care about her. No, no, no, NO.

"You lying son of a bitch," She spat, her voice hoarse as she fought to keep her volume low. She didn't want to wake him. Not yet.

:::

Robin's eyes blinked open as sunshine glittered through the thin curtains of Regina's room. He groaned as he rubbed his eyes, letting them adjust to the bright light filling the small space. He groped blindly beside him, hoping to bring Regina back into him and steal some of her warmth. But she wasn't there. He cracked his eyes open and ran his hand along the cold sheets on her side of the bed.

Sitting up, he took in the room. His clothes were thrown in a pile across the room, not where Regina had pulled them off of him the night before, and he slunk over to them reluctantly to tug them on.

He padded down the stairs, assuming she'd be in the kitchen or the living room, but he was met by a strange silence across the entire house. The kitchen was undisturbed by a coffee pot or breakfast dishes, the couch was unruffled from anyone sitting down, and there was no newspaper or book spread across the coffee table.

Regina wasn't here. _What the hell?_

She wasn't one to fuck and run, and he knew he had fallen asleep next to her – oh shit, she doesn't sleep. Right.

Quickly throwing on his jacket and scarf, he hurried back to the Charming's loft. He didn't know where Regina would go, but he assumed she'd be hiding from her family again, so he might as well take the chance to check in.

"What the hell happened to you?" Emma demanded as soon as he pushed through the door. Robin ground his teeth, _back to this again_. He closed the door and stepped inside, shrugging as he looked to each of the adults. "All we get was the one text and then nothing all night?"

"Text?" Robin scrunched his face as he walked towards the kitchen. "I never even got to talk to Regina, let alone text you before I fell asleep."

"Then what…" Emma trailed off as she took in his dishevelled hair and rumpled clothes, rolling her eyes in disgust. "Nevermind."

"But you replied last night." Hook added.

"What?" Robin fumbled around in his pockets, checking his jacket, his jeans, and patting the sides of his pants. Where was his phone?

"I didn't…" Robin's face fell and his eyes widened. _Oh fuck_. "Oh God. _Regina_. She can't sleep now and she must have checked my phone."

Hook's jaw fell, and Emma inhaled sharply. Snow and David glanced at each other nervously, and Robin felt a flare of annoyance light in his gut.

"What the hell was the text you sent?!"

Emma looked at Hook and hung her head. "She knows about the dagger."

"Oh fuck…" Robin ran his fingers through his hair and tugged at it lightly. "She was gone this morning." His palms grew slick and a flush of heat coasted from his belly to his cheeks. "She's going to kill us."

A sudden crash of thunder cracked overhead, loud enough to shake the loft, and Robin's stomach dropped in his gut. Henry ran downstairs, panicked and afraid as he met his family, each with their own look of horror screwing up their faces. Regina knew, and they were definitely, one hundred percent, royally screwed.


	4. Chapter 4

_I am so sorry for how long this took, but you know how it is, life happens. Thank you so much for being so patient, and for encouraging this story to continue!_

* * *

"Well that's a good sign," Hook said, rather too cheerfully for Robin's liking. It seemed everyone in this apartment was set on plucking his every nerve.

"Maybe it's just-"

A flash of lightning illuminated all of the windows for a moment, and another crash of thunder shook the loft, flickering the few lights off in the previously bright early morning. Now the sky darkened and swirled with black and grey clouds, circling over the entire town.

Robin raised his eyebrows and exhaled loudly through his nose, glaring at the adults around him. A wordless _now what_ hung in the air between the group.

A shrill ring of the phone interrupted the shocked silence, probably the first of many Storybrooke citizens worried about a loss of power, and Snow scurried away to answer it.

"What is she going to do?" Henry asked, visibly fighting the fear inside of him.

"Anything," Hook muttered, shaking his head.

"She'll have a plan," Emma said, "She won't attack anyone without reason. She's smart, not reckless."

"I don't know, Emma." David stepped towards his daughter. "You never saw her before, she was pretty reckless as the Evil Queen. Causing pain was her specialty."

"This is different," Robin insisted, "Emma's right. She's hurt and angry, she'll have already devised a plan of who to hurt first, and I'd bet she's working on it right now."

"So how do we stop her? There has to be something we can do to get through to her." Henry frowned as he looked to Robin for guidance. He sighed and ran his hand through his hair, his mind racing, thoughts spinning so fast it made him dizzy.

 _This is my fault, I did this, and now everyone is going to pay for it._

"We have to find her first," Robin said, "She's probably hiding before she chooses when to make the first move."

"She's already made it," Snow said hopelessly, clutching the phone as she returned to her family with a look of fear Robin had never seen on the younger woman. "That was nurse Ratchet… Zelena's gone."

:::

Glaring down at her unconscious sister, Regina scrunched her nose in disgust. There was an endless list of possible torments she could unleash on Zelena, but Regina knew she had to control herself, to rein in the lust for blood if she was going to achieve her ultimate level of pain. This was enough, this would hurt more than any lacerations to her pale skin ever could, so she clenched her fist around her dagger, pushing at the flare of heat in her palms, and paced in front of her first victim.

With a wave of Regina's hand, Zelena stirred from her place sitting atop of the Storybrooke clock tower. Her head rolled from one side to the other groggily, and she jumped against the restraints holding her to the peak of the tower when her gaze fell to the ground far below her. Her eyes blew wide, certainly very awake now, and she stuttered as she watched Regina pace slowly in mid air, floating above the sidewalk below them.

"What the hell?!" Zelena yelled, "What's going on?" She pressed her back into the poll that held her from a deadly plummet to the ground while she ran her eyes up and down Regina, taking in the silky black dress and wild hair of the Dark One. "What the hell happened to you? Spicing it up with Robin lately?"

Regina shook her head and forced a smile at the other woman. "I got a new toy." She held up her dagger, turning the blade to show her name carved into the side. Zelena's eyes widened and her mouth fell open, stumbling over her words.

"Wait… You didn't -did you…"

"No, I didn't kill the imp," Regina flashed her eyes to the sky, "He's pleasantly safe tucked in bed with his true love Belle."

"That doesn't make sense, so you're-"

"The Dark One." Regina's palms burned, fire itching just below the skin, and she rubbed them on her hips to calm herself.

Zelena's gaze fell to the ground below her, and she let out a choked laugh. "Well, I guess this isn't a loving sisterly visit then, is it?"

Regina stalked towards her, bending until she was nose to nose with her sister before she growled "Hardly."

"You're not going to kill me," Zelena tried meekly, "I'm carrying Robin's baby."

"I'm _well_ aware." Regina's eyes burned into her sister as she leaned back, tilting her head to look down Main Street before a grin spread across her lips. "But you're right, I'm not going to kill you. We were just waiting for the cavalry to arrive."

The women heard a distant " _Regina!"_ echo up to them from down on the street, and Regina set her shoulders, allowing the burning rage inside her to boil closer to the surface. Now, it was time to get the ball rolling.

"Regina!" Emma yelled again, and she looked down to find her friend standing beneath her, next to Snow, Charming, Hook, and Robin. For a moment Regina thanked her lucky stars that the other woman left Henry at home. "Regina what are you doing?"

"I'm a little busy, Swan." Regina stepped back from Zelena and waved her hand to release the bonds holding her sister to the clock tower. She floated them further out into the street before lowering them to stand across from the heroes. She used her magic to hold Zelena up, gripping her by her neck, and she relished in the way Robin's features pinched in pain at the thought of his baby in distress.

Emma stepped forward, ever the hero, and held her hands up defensively. "Look, we know that you're pissed-"

" _Pissed_?" Regina huffed, "I am _miles_ past pissed. How dare you – _any_ of you – think you can touch this?" She held up her dagger, her hand shaking as she stared at Emma.

"We shouldn't have, we know that. But we thought it was our best chance-"

"To what?" Regina interrupted. "Control me? Stop the darkness?"

"To _help_ you," Emma insisted, "We care about you, we want to help."

"You care about yourselves, that much has always been clear." She stepped back, pacing between Zelena and the heroes. "I'm the villain, isn't that right? Dark One or not, you have _never_ cared about my happiness."

"Regina, you know that's not true." Snow moved behind her daughter, placing a hand on her arm. "You're our family, and we know you can get through this if-"

"If what?" She growled, rounding on Snow. "If I believe in hope? If I make the right choices? That is _bullshit_! I can make all the right choices I want and I will never win!" She inched closer to Snow, finding fear hidden in her strong gaze. "Heroism has done me no favours, I have lost and lost, and I am tired of having no control."

"We thought we could take away your temptation!" Snow blurts out quickly, making Regina pause. "You can control the darkness, we know you can, but we wanted to help."

She looked around the group, eyes lingering on Robin for only a moment before passing over the other faces. Each face sparked a flare of rage inside her, boiling and churning in her gut. _She's lying_ , something whispered in the back of her mind, _they want to protect themselves from you._

"You're lying. You don't trust me. And frankly, I don't trust you."

Movement over Snow's shoulder caught Regina's attention, and her palms burned with tingling magic as Robin stepped towards her.

"Regin-"

" _NO!"_ She pushed a hand out, a wave of magic pulsing through the ground and knocking everyone away from her. She raised a hand and gripped Robin's throat with her magic, holding him in place as he fought against her. "Don't. Don't get me _started_ on you. I _trusted_ you, _I loved you!"_

"Please… Regina-" He choked, gasping for air through her vice grip, "I didn't want to hurt you."

" _You lied to me_! I did this for you and you betrayed me!" Her voice cracked and her eyes welled with tears, her hand trembling as she held Robin with her magic. "You're just like everyone else. You just want something from me, to _use_ me."

"You know that's not true."

"Do I? Look at yourself, Robin!" She waved a hand around her, glaring at each of the Charmings. "You're a hero, right? You're all the same; petty self-righteous liars."

"We were never going to control you," Robin insisted, pleading with his eyes.

"Oh weren't you? You just wanted my dagger for what? Do you have a cutlery collection that needs completion?"

"Please, Regina, I know we screwed up, but you can trust all of us."

"I have no reason to trust _any_ of you," she spat, releasing her hold on Robin as she walked in front of each of the heroes, ignoring Robin's coughs and gasps for air. "The girl who killed my first love, the man who never let me forget who I really was, the pirate who double-crossed me, and the woman who took the only thing I loved."

Robin righted himself, calling out to Regina again as she turned away from him. "Do whatever you want to me, just don't kill Zelena."

Regina froze, her heart suddenly racing in her chest. "Kill _her_?" she smirked. "It's not her I was after. You can have her back now if she's so important to you."

She waved a hand, pushing Zelena clumsily towards the heroes. She fell to her knees, Snow catching her before she could fully hit the ground, and the wild look in her eyes sent a thrill through Regina's chest.

"But - why…" Emma started, looking between Zelena and Regina. Her eyes blew wide when the realization hit her, and her jaw fell open. "Regina, you didn't…"

Zelena's hands started to tremble as she clutched at her stomach, and each hero looked shocked and horrified. But it was only Robin's face that she cared about; the look of confusion, terror, and hatred mixing amongst his features was exactly what she had wanted.

He looked as if he was fighting the urge to shake, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides, his eyes were wide and rapidly moving, and his breath shot out in quick short gasps.

"Regina… if you hurt my child-"

"What?" She tested him, eyes sparkling with her madness.

He ground his teeth, his eyes shining and his skin flushing in his fury. "I can not forgive you."

Something pinched in her chest, sharp and agonizing, when she looked at his face, but she ignored it. "It is not me who needs forgiveness."

His face fell, anger replaced with shock and almost… hopelessness. He didn't believe it, she realized, he didn't think she had it in her. She forced a vicious smile and turned on her heels, marching away from the scene before her.

" _REGINA!"_

She froze, every muscle in her body tense and burning. Her eyes stung with tears, and she cursed herself for the pain in her heart. Still, she turned to him, eyes shining as they locked their gaze. He didn't look like himself, he was wild and boiling with a rage she'd never seen, as if he was burning every ounce of hatred he held in his soul just for her. "I will destroy you."

Her smile never faltered, but froze in an inhuman way, pain shining through her eyes as she flashed her white teeth.

"Good luck with that."

:::

Everything was gone. In a flash of purple smoke, she took everything from him. His love, his hope, their future, his child.

His _child_.

The small bump that had caused so much confusion, so much pain and fear, mixed with a pure and instinctual love, erased with the bat of an eye. His first thought had been relief, relief that the cause of so much tension between himself and Regina, the reason his world had been turned upside down could be so simply resolved, but a gut wrenching guilt at ever having such a thought instantly washed it away. Painful circumstance or not, that was his child, and he did not fault the innocent life for how he or she was created.

But now the baby was gone. It could have never even existed.

He saw red.

He was going to kill her.

Zelena had collapsed to the ground, gripping her stomach as sobs wracked her body, and her wailing only infuriated Robin further. She had no right to be so devastated; she had no emotional connection to this child, none that she had ever expressed anyway. She had manipulated him, she had violated him, and now he had lost the only positive part of this disastrous situation, and _she_ was acting as if her world had collapsed. Unbelievable.

"Will you _please_ shut the hell up for five seconds?" Robin shouted over his shoulder as he paced in front of the group.

"Robin!" Snow scolded, kneeling next to Zelena as her sobs quieted to a whine-filled sniffling. "It's okay, Regina's bluffing."

"N-no she's n-not." Zelena shook her head, red curls bouncing rapidly. "Something feels wr-wrong."

"We should get her to doctor Whale. _Now_." Snow looked up to Emma, who nodded once and knelt beside Zelena, placing her hand on her arm and disappearing in a cloud of silver smoke.

Robin flexed his fingers, sucking in a shaky breath to calm himself. With Zelena gone, at least he could try to process what was going on around him.

"She's lying, Robin." Snow stepped closer to him, reaching out gently only to recoil when he flinched away from her. "Regina would never do this to you, you know that."

"She's not Regina. She's the Dark One." He narrowed his eyes as he spat the last words at Snow, his throat tightening with each passing second. Everything felt tight, anxious, as if he was teetering on an edge and trying desperately not to fall.

"She's still in there, you've seen it."

He shook his head, releasing some of the tension in his shoulders. "I betrayed her. I broke the final piece of Regina, I made her let the darkness in."

"You can _not_ blame yourself." Snow moved directly in front of him, forcing his eyes to meet hers. "No matter what she has done, this is _Regina's_ choice. She's just hurt and lashing out. Trust me, she is going to be beating herself up enough for both of you."

"Somehow I doubt that." He clenched his jaw and scowled as Snow sighed, shaking her head.

"Look, I can't imagine what you're feeling right now, how painful this must be, but I believe in Regina. You should too."

"That's easy for you to say," Robin growled, "She didn't kill your child."

"But she tried to." Snow said, breaking Robin's burning hatred for a moment. "She tried to kill Emma when she was born, and she failed. But she's not that person anymore, Dark One or not, and I believe in her. I know she's lying."

Robin rolled his eyes. "You should learn to bottle hope and sell it, you'd make a killing." He turned to Hook and Charming, gave them some weak excuse of going back to camp to check on Roland, promising to meet them at the hospital in an hour, and stormed away from Snow's bubble of hope speeches and sad smiles.

He didn't need hope, he needed to shoot something. To punch and kick and scream until his body ached as much as his heart did. So he'd go check on his son, punch a tree or two, and check on Zelena, to see if Regina truly had a death wish.

:::

She was going to be sick.

The pitching of her stomach felt endless, swirling the world around her with each new wave of nausea, and the sweat gathering at the back of her neck had her tangled hair sticking to her skin. She hated being sick, the retching and dry heaving, the burning throat and running eyes.

Though she supposed she deserved it. The agony she found on Robin's face, the shock, the pure _hatred_ , was enough to send her stomach so furiously rolling with guilt that she was curled into a ball on the dusty floor of her vault, praying to any god listening for the waves of sickness to pass.

 _He deserves it. He lied to you. He betrayed you. He never loved you._

She pressed her forehead to the cool stone of the floor and measured her breathing; in, out, in, out.

 _What did I do? I love him, and I destroyed him. I'm a monster._

Oh God, she couldn't stop it, and as her stomach pinched she pushed off the floor and threw herself across her vault, grabbing an empty box and heaving her guts into it. She retched and gagged, spitting the strings of spit off of her lips between each burning heave of her stomach.

"My God, you look awful."

Regina groaned and pressed her eyes shut as she fought against her dry heaving. Now? _Really_? What the hell did she want?

"Go away, Mal."

"Now that's no way to treat a friend, darling." Maleficent slipped down the vault stairs, high heels clicking against stone, and leaned against a tall chest across the room, keeping her distance as Regina wiped her mouth and used her magic to remove any trace of her sickness.

She pushed off of the floor with shaky limbs, landed rather gracelessly on one of her trunks and glared at Mal.

"What do you want?" She croaked, pressing the back of her hand to her clammy forehead.

"I'm checking on you." She shrugged before running her slim fingers through her blonde curls.

"I don't need you checking on me. I'm fine."

"The noises I heard as I was coming in here beg to differ, you sounded like you were spitting out a few organs."

"Felt like it," Regina admitted, "But I'm not a child. I can handle it."

"Are we talking about a little sickness, or your being the Dark One?" Mal's voice sounded distant, laced with a bit more venom than her usual nonchalant demeanour.

Regina rolled her eyes before pinching them together when the motion sent her stomach rolling again. "Are you here because you care, or because you're pissed at me? Because I really don't need that right now."

Mal paused, chewing her bottom lip before shaking her head. "I'm not angry with you. A little disappointed that I had to hear about you being _the Dark One_ from a pretentious princess, but…"

"You talked to Snow?" She asked, almost accusing, and huffed her irritation when the dragon simply shrugged. "To be fair, I've been a little busy." Her voice dropped to something like a growl, and Mal's brow rose as she took her in.

Regina had often struggled to read Maleficent; despite their intricate relationship, Mal was an expert on building walls, on hiding her emotions from anyone and everyone. She always had a glitter in her eye, a mischievous grin on her lips, her hardened armour to protect her cracked center. So, as she watched the dragon stare her down, she couldn't tell exactly what she was thinking. She looked amused and unimpressed, but Regina suspected that she was hiding a lick of disappointment and hurt.

After a long moment, Mal pursed her lips, breathing a simple "why?"

Regina blinked, scrunching her brow at her. "Why what?"

She stepped closer, the corners of her lips dropping as she reached out to run her fingers through Regina's tangled mane of hair. Her voice came out low and hoarse, thick with the emotion she always held for her, and her alone. "Why on Earth would you do this to yourself?"

A pinch in Regina's heart had her inhaling as Mal moved her hand to place a single finger under her chin. She swallowed thickly, watching the storming blue eyes that hovered above her as she struggled to find her words. "Robin… he - he was going to die. I had no choice – we… it's complicated…"

"Oh for God sakes Regina." Mal pushed away and paced a short circle around the vault. "You took on the darkness to save _some guy_?"

"I _love_ him!" Regina countered, finding her strength to rise to her feet.

"So that explains why you killed his child," Mal spat back.

"I didn't-"

"Don't bullshit me, this is a complete shit show and I can not understand why you would _ever_ take the darkness from that bastard Rumple, _especially_ after everything he's done to you."

"I needed to save everyone!" Regina clenched her fists at her sides, huffing in exasperation. "Emma did a bang up job of getting nearly everyone killed when she was the Dark One, I can actually handle it!"

"So is that what this is?" Mal stepped closer, coming nose to nose as she glared down at her. "You think you're strong enough to control the darkness alone? To what, exactly? Finally be a hero? Because killing children certainly isn't the way to do that, little one."

"Don't patronize me," Regina warned, "I… I thought I was doing the right thing."

"And now?" Mal raised her brow, more patience in her voice than before.

Regina's hands trembled at her sides, and she pressed one to her stomach as she paced across the room.

 _You're saving_ yourself _now, dearie. They destroyed you; you're returning the favour._

" _Shut up!"_ She screamed, grabbing the nearest bottle and hurling it at the empty corner of the vault. Mal jumped despite herself, eyes flashing from the shattered bottle to Regina's shaking form.

"He really is in your head, isn't he?"

She ran a hand through her hair, gripping the back of her skull as she inhaled deeply and dropped back into her seat on her trunk.

"God, I'm a disaster." She slumped forward, pressing her face into her palms.

She heard Maleficent sigh softly and looked up to see her kneeling in front of her, taking her hands in her own and squeezing gently. She was so warm, she always felt like the fire burning below her skin, and Regina drank in the heat, using it to calm her shaking insides. Mal lifted a hand to her cheek, brushing her thumb along the soft skin to catch the stray tear that slipped from Regina's eye.

"I don't know what's going on in your head little one, but I want to help you."

"You can't." Regina shook her head. "This darkness… it consumes me. It swallows me whole and I lose myself."

"I can handle a little darkness, I've seen it before." Mal smile softly, a delicate thing filled with a glow that Regina hadn't seen in decades. She had lost herself to darkness before, had snuffed out the young girl that had once admired a fierce dragon, and she remembered how she had also killed the warm glow that Maleficent always held for her. She'd lost herself, and she'd lost her only friend, had she doomed herself to going down this path again?

"Get out of your head, Regina," Mal whispered, playful and light as always, "I know you've got quite the mess going on up there. But I really do want to help, however you'll take it."

"And if I don't want you to try to stop me?" Regina tried, feeling a lick of heat burn in her veins, the darkness sneaking back into her focus.

"Who said I wanted to stop you?" Mal grinned at her, a sweet, malicious smile that lit something else in Regina's heart, something warm and familiar. "I'm certainly no hero, darling."

Regina mirrored her then, lips spreading into a satisfied smirk.

"No, we certainly aren't."

:::

The hospital always has a particular smell, one Robin would never have encountered in the Enchanted Forest, like sanitation and latex, like crisp cleanness mixed with disinfectant. Overall it's not a terrible smell, but it's not _pleasant_ either. It sets him on edge, makes him think of every terrible time he's had to enter this building. When Henry tried to teach Roland to ride a bike, ending in a twisted wrist, when Regina had one too many run-ins with magic and had to be checked out, when Marian was suddenly Zelena and they needed somewhere to keep the pregnant witch.

Hospitals were where you went when you were in pain, and it was one of the few things Robin dreaded most in this whole town.

He had done as he'd promised, checked on Roland to make sure he was as happily oblivious to the misery of their world as he was when he'd left him with Little John, and had even thrown a punch at a tree on his way out. He had busted his knuckles, and the ache when he moved his hand made him worry he'd broken a bone, but he couldn't find it in himself to care. It didn't hurt nearly as much as his heart did.

Pushing through the hospital doors, he spied the Charmings standing next to the waiting room, Snow with a phone pressed tight to her ear as she spoke quickly and quietly. As he approached, he saw Emma and Hook seated not so far away, and they rose out of their seats as Robin stepped closer. He was just able to catch the tail end of Snow's conversation before she quickly hung up.

"Yes, yes I know – look, just check on her, please. No – don't – I have to go."

"And who was that?" Robin asked, hiding no barb from his tone.

"No one." Snow shrugged him off, pocketing the phone and reaching for David's hand. "Just checking on Granny and Henry. They're fine, none the wiser to what's happening with Regina."

Robin glared at her, not buying what she was trying to sell, but he didn't have a chance to press her on the subject before she reached for his battered hand.

"What did you do? Punch a tree?"

He pulled back from her and stuffed his hand in his pocket, biting his tongue when the movement sent a shock of pain up his arm.

"Where's Zelena?"

"Whale's checking her now," Emma told him with a grimace. "But… it didn't look promising."

He felt another stab to his heart, a tightening as his hope dwindled with each passing second. How could this happen, _what_ was even happening? The child he hadn't expected, had felt guilty for wanting, was ripped away from him by the very person who inspired this guilt in the first place. His love, his _soulmate_.

Everything felt hot, like he could burst into flames with the rage boiling inside of him.

Footsteps echoed down the vacant corridor, and Whale approached the group with his usual playful grin. "Well well, isn't this quite the party? I wouldn't expect this many people to be here for Zelena."

"My child," Robin clarified, glowering at the doctor. "What's happening?"

"Well, that's the thing." Whale clasped his hands in front of him, wringing them nervously. "I… don't know. The sonograms aren't picking up anything inside Zelena, no baby, no usual organs or veins, _nothing_. We've run other tests, blood work and physicals, and everything appears as it had last week. Except… we just can't see the baby."

"So… the baby could be okay?" Snow asked, radiating hope that rubbed Robin the wrong way.

"Well if it is, this is not a good situation to be in. We can't examine the baby, we can't see if there are any developmental issues, and if something were to happen to Zelena, we wouldn't be able to help the baby at all." Whale was slowly losing his chipper demeanour and slipping into something far more sombre, which only increased the panic growing in Robin's chest when the doctor turned to address him directly. "At this point, if your baby isn't already gone, it could be soon… and we wouldn't even know it."

Robin took a shaky breath, pressing his good hand to his gut to try and settle the trembling inside. Emma lifted a hand to his arm and rubbed up and down once, something Robin found himself grateful for.

"So what do we do?" Emma asked, taking control of the situation, and Robin was yet again grateful for her, for her leadership and refusal to give up.

Whale rocked back on his heels, huffing out a breath. "I'd say you need to talk to Regina, and figure out exactly what she did to her sister, because right now… I have nothing to treat."

"Finding Regina and talking to her might prove more difficult than you'd think," Charming said with a shake of his head.

Whale shrugged his shoulders. "She wants to kill everyone, right? Dark One and everything? Give her a reason to come find you."

:::

The bell above the door to Gold's shop run as Regina flicked her wrist and flung the door open, storming inside with Mal close on her heels. Belle was behind the counter and jumped at the sound, knocking a few trinkets to the floor when she turned to face the two women.

"Hello, darling," Regina flourished her hand as Belle scowled at her, "I'm looking for your comatose husband. I have a present for him."

"You're not going to touch him," Belle said firmly, stepping around the counter to block Regina's path.

"You've always been painfully brave, but I'm afraid you can't stop me."

"Doesn't mean I won't try," Belle countered, stepping further towards Regina. She raised her brow, slightly impressed by the girl's guts, but had no time to let out her next snarky comment before Mal waved her hand and froze Belle in her place.

"I really don't want to deal with the bookworm today," She groaned.

Regina shot her a sly grin over her should before they moved around Belle's frozen form and stepped into Rumple's office. He was out in the open, an easier target than a wilting flower, and Regina grinned maliciously as she looked down at his lifeless body.

"Rather pathetic, isn't he?" Mal mused, a disgusted look twisting her features as she combed her eyes over Rumple.

Regina raised her eyebrows, response enough for her friend, and pulled her dagger from its place at her hip, holding it up to Rumple's neck.

"It would be so easy to slit your pretty throat, dearie. God knows you deserve it." She slid the tip of the dagger down his neck, pressing the blade just hard enough to break the skin and spill a drop of red blood. "But this, this is much more delicious."

"A fate worse than death for the man who could never die." Mal's eyes sparkled with pride as she watched Regina move across the room, lift a framed picture that held a sealed vault, and press the blood-covered tip of the dagger to a small scanner on the door. It swung open and revealed a small pile of treasures, of magical objects most precious to the previous Dark One.

Regina returned her dagger to her hip and reach inside the vault carefully, plucked a small velvet bag from the back of the vault and pulled it out. She peered inside, careful not to touch the metal of the wraith's medallion tucked inside, and lifted her eyes to meet Mal's, finding encouragement and bloodlust in her sky blue irises.

"You know…" Regina started slowly. "You never told me why you have a vendetta against Rumple. Not that he doesn't deserve a little torture for the sake of torture, but that's certainly not your style anymore."

Mal stiffened, her posture awkward and ridged before she shifted her weight and forced her shoulders to relax. "He manipulated me… and tried to hurt someone I love."

"Your daughter."

Regina heard Mal's voice catch from across the room, and an unfamiliar twist of jealousy and misery pinched her heart.

"So you know," was all the dragon said, and Regina snorted a laugh.

"It's not easy to keep secrets in Storybrooke. Small town, people talk. Besides, it's not like you had many loved ones in the past. You and I had that in common."

"But you're not angry with me… for not telling you." She didn't ask, she assumed, and Regina couldn't stop herself from frowning. Mal quickly closed the distance between them, lifted a finger and placed it under Regina's chin to move her gaze up to her eyes. She felt dampness pool at her lashes, and she quickly blinked it away.

"I know why you didn't tell me. I didn't deserve such trust from you. Not then."

Mal shook her head and pressed her warm palm to Regina's cool cheek. "You were suffering from your own misery, there was no need for you to endure mine too."

Regina lifted her hand and wrapped her fingers around Mal's wrist, swirling her finger on the smooth skin absently. "How is it that, no matter how terrible I was, you could always find a reason to forgive me, to blame yourself?"

She smiled that warm, genuine smile, the one that always melted Regina's heart, and let out a soft laugh. "I'm not the _only_ person who can learn to forgive you, little one, and I won't be the last."

Her words struck her heart, made her watery smile drop to something pinched with pain, and Mal rubbed her thumb along her cheek knowingly. She couldn't think about that, not now, not when it was too late, so she clutched the velvet bag tucked securely in her hand and lifted it for both of them to examine.

She slid her gaze from the dragon to the sleeping man next to them as a smile spread across her red lips. She used her sleeve to cover her skin, reached into the bag, and held the medallion up to the light, letting it shine in the pale yellow light of the bedside lamp.

"Shall we?"

:::

"You're sure this is going to work?"

"Absolutely. She'd never let anyone harm Henry."

"This feels wrong," Robin admitted, looking between each of the heroes before him. "We can't use Henry to get to Regina."

"You're not using me," Henry insisted, "I volunteered. I have to help my mom, and I don't want her hurting any more people I care about." His voice was low and sad, something very off of his usual inspired self, and it sent another pulse of guilt through him. Henry was suffering, miserable without his mother by his side, and this was his idea of helping. Bloody hell.

"We'll be right below him, Robin," Emma promised with a reassuring nod. "And Zelena has the cuff, she can't go anywhere."

"Thank you for the reminder," Zelena quipped, dramatically rolling her eyes. "Let's not forget I did agree not to harm him."

"It will work, we just need her to talk to us." Charming said, met with a nod from Hook and Emma.

Robin turned to Snow, hoping beyond hope to find a similar pang of guilt in her eyes, but if it did exist, she hid it well. Her features were set as stone as she looked between Henry and Emma, and she nodded solemnly, moving to take her place beneath the clock tower.

A crash of thunder overhead startled the group, and fast moving black clouds moved across the sky, blocking out the sun and cooling the air instantly.

"We gotta do this now," Emma turned to Henry, who took her hand as she placed her other on Zelena's shoulder. A cloud of silver circled them, disappearing and reappearing atop the library, where Emma left Zelena to hold Henry, pretending to hold him against his will.

Robin hustled to his place between Snow and Emma, his bow clutched tight in his grasp as he listened for Henry's screams over the sound of the rolling thunder.

" _MOM! HELP!"_

:::

The sky was already darkening, swirling and twisting as magic called the wraith to Storybrooke, and the wind hurled past Regina, picking up dust from the road and tangling it in her hair. She squinted and shielded her eyes from the blowing dirt as she stepped out of Gold's shop, searching the glooming streets for the source of the screaming.

Mal was close behind her, she could feel her hand pressed to the small of her back, and she shouted over the growing storm to get her attention, pointing to the top of the library where two figures were visible just behind the clock tower.

" _Henry_!" Regina screamed, her voice muted by the whirling winds.

She tried to make him out, tried to see if it really was him squirming in a particular red head's grasp, and a faint, " _Mom_!" could be heard over the storm.

She turned to Mal, desperate and afraid, and pressed a trembling hand to her stomach. She had to save Henry, but she couldn't – he'd hate her, he won't love her. She was certain Mal understood, could see the fear pouring from her eyes, and she yelled to her, "What do I do?"

Mal took her hand, squeezed once, and pasted on a devilish smirk. "You kick that witch's green ass." She closed her eyes briefly and encircled them in a black cloud, dropping them on the library roof, where Regina could see her sister gripping her son's neck, bending his arm behind his back.

"Hey green bean," Mal shouted, "Let him go."

"Not likely, dragon," Zelena spat as she tugged Henry's arm back farther, making him wince. "It seems only fair, doesn't it? Regina takes my child, I take hers."

" _Zelena_ ," Regina warned, "I don't want to hurt you anymore than I already have."

"That's a lie. You want to destroy everything. But maybe I want some destruction too."

She held her hand out towards her sister, used her magic to reach out to her and gripped the back of her jacket to throw her off balance, loosening her hold on Henry. He stumbled with Zelena before kicking back and hitting her in the gut. She tumbled to the floor where Mal held her down with her magic, and Henry ran towards Regina. He stopped abruptly, looking at her with uncertainty she hadn't seen from him in years.

"Henry, it's okay," she tried, giving him a watery smile. "You know I'd never hurt you."

He paused, eyes raking her as the wind whipped his jacket and scarf around him. She pleaded with her eyes, hoping that he could see past the darkness that was sucking her in, that was poisoning her mind, and find his mother inside her.

"You hurt Robin's baby," he said, more statement of fact than question.

Her heart jumped, surprised by his knowledge of her terrible actions. For a moment she lost her words and just shook her head. "It's… No, Henry, I… It's complicated."

"You gave in to the darkness and now you're destroying _everything_!"

"I didn't have a choice, they want to destroy me!"

"No they don't!" He insisted, stepping closer to his mother and pointed towards the street. "They want to help! Why won't you listen?"

"You don't understand-"

"No! You're stronger than this, I know you are. Stop doing this!" He waved his arms to the sky in frustration.

"I can't!" Regina screamed. "I can't stop it."

He chewed his lips as his eyes darted around, took a deep breath, and ran towards Regina, crashing into her and squeezing her as hard as he could.

It was like a pressure in her chest was released, like the hold the darkness had on her was cracked by Henry's tight embrace, and she felt a warmth bloom in her chest that had been gone for far too long.

"Let us help you, please Mom." He held her tighter, pressing his face into her neck, tangling his face in her long wild hair, and she nodded before she could think. He was right, she new it deep in her soul, and she would do anything for him.

She looked up to glare at Zelena, and raised a hand to grab the witch with her magic before Henry took her hand and stopped her.

"Don't! It was fake, she was supposed to pretend to hurt me."

Regina felt a pang of anger punch at her gut and she flashed her eyes at her sister. Only when Henry squeezed her tighter did the feeling subside, and she hugged him back, pressing all of her love for him into his embrace.

Thunder crashed overhead and Henry jumped in Regina's arms before tilting his head to look up at his mother. The storm grew worse around them as rain started to fall from the swirling dark clouds overhead.

"Please Mom, stop this!"

"I don't know how." She shook her head, pressing her cheek to the top of Henry's hair.

"Emma can help! She's down there!" He turned and pointed below them and sure enough, Regina spotted a blonde head beneath the clock tower, next to several brunettes.

She looked over her shoulder to where Mal stood, watching from a distance, and she nodded towards Zelena, wordlessly instructing her to grab her sister. When both were ready, they disappeared in clouds of purple and black, reappearing on the ground next to the heroes.

"Regina, what's going on?" Emma yelled over the growing rush of the wind. She held her hand over her face, trying to look at Regina and Henry as the storm swirled around them.

"I summoned a wraith to kill Rumple." Regina explained, watching each face of the heroes drop in shock and fear.

"Isn't that lovely," Hook said with a roll of his eyes, "A soul sucking demon is just what we need, isn't it?"

"I could use a little less judgement, guyliner." Regina shot him a warning glance, and he turned away from her, bumping into Robin's bow as he moved.

Robin. He looked like a stranger. His features were pinched and painful, his mouth set in a stern line, his cheeks flaring red, either from the bite of the cold air or the burning rage inside of him that he now held for her, and only her. But all of that together could not compare to the look in his eyes. The way he looked at her made her feel like a caged beast on display, something inhuman and pathetic, a monster not worthy of any human emotion. Like he truly despised her.

"Can you stop it?" Snow asked, breaking Regina's concentration. She shook her head, hugging Henry tighter to her side.

"What about what we did last time? Sending it through a portal?" David suggested. Everyone paused, waiting for anyone to suggest something better, and when no one spoke up, Regina nodded.

"Fine, that's our best bet. But if it's going after Rumple we need to get him out here, to guide the wraith to us. He's in his shop, unconscious in the back room."

"On it," David nodded, grabbing Hook and Robin by the sleeves and dragging them across the street to Gold's shop.

"Since Rumple's not awake, his presence will draw the wraith to us but someone needs to guide the wraith towards the portal."

"I'll do it!"

"Henry! No!" Regina and Emma shouted in unison.

"I'm the smallest one here, I can get close to the portal without getting pulled in!"

"I'm not letting you put yourself in danger."

"I'll be fine! I trust you!" He placed a hand on Regina's arm and squeezed, beaming at her. "Mom I believe in you, let me help you."

"To be fair, he was right about Zelena," Emma said, nodding to the witch, still being held with Maleficent's magic.

Rain started to pour down harder, soaking into Regina's curls and dampening the cold silk that clung to her body. The wraith would be there at any moment, they had to act fast.

"Fine! But Emma stands next to you," she pointed to Henry, "You duck out of the way, and she grabs you."

He nodded once, confident and strong, and quickly hugged his mother before she stepped into the middle of the street. She waved her hand, summoning the Sorcerer's wand, and held it out in front of her. The tip glowed white, opening a spiralling portal on the ground before her. She could see her family stepping behind her, Robin, Hook, and David carrying a limp Rumple to place next to her. Once he was ready, Henry stepped in front of the group, closest to the portal, and bounced on the spot to prepare himself.

An ear-splitting screech sounded above them, and everyone looked up to see the wraith descending from the black clouds. It's dark cloak billowed around it as the storm raged on, soaking each person to the bone. Regina held both her arms out, clinging to the wand as the portal grew stronger, waves of white and blue swirling together to pull whatever it could into another realm.

"Emma, you get ready to pull him back as soon as the wraith goes into the portal."

Regina's hands shook furiously, her arms burned, but she pushed all of her magic to her fingertips, holding the portal open with everything she had. The wand burned in her palm, glowing a blinding white, and she itched to let it drop, to release the hold this magic had on her.

Henry braced himself in front of the portal, waving his hands above his head as he stepped closer to it. He waited for the perfect time, watched the wraith duck towards him, and before Regina could shout " _Now, Henry!"_ he ducked and rolled under the wraith's flying figure. It tried to turn, to catch him before he got away, but the magic of the portal flared and grabbed it, tugging it inside.

"Yes!" Henry hollered, jumping in Emma's embrace. "You did it, Mom!"

Regina's hands kept shaking uncontrollably, and the wand still glowed in her hands.

"Regina! Close the portal!" Emma yelled to her.

"I… I can't!" Regina screamed, her chest tightening as fear prickled the back of her mind. "It won't stop!"

Regina turned to look over her shoulder, locked eyes with Emma for just a moment before her friend gave her a reassuring smile. "Come on, Regina, you can control this! You're strong enough."

She almost didn't register what Emma had said, or the hope in her and Henry's eyes, as her gaze drifted over Emma's shoulder to Zelena.

The world froze; the air around her had turned solid, keeping her still. The blood pounding in her veins slowed to a halt, her every muscle tense and stuck, unmoving and completely out of her control as she watched her sister move behind Emma and Henry, throwing her hands out until both of them tipped over, falling to the ground and rolling towards the swirling flashes of the portal.

She couldn't stop it, couldn't move a single inch as they tumbled down, tangled limbs and confused screams as they slipped into the portal. Only once they were gone could she move, feel the weight of the air trapped in her lungs. She twisted her arms, closing the portal, and her knees gave out, dropping her to the cold pavement.

The silence was deafening. No more drops of rain, or rushing winds, no more screams of fear or words of encouragement. Everything stopped.

Regina ran her hands along the pavement, desperate to reach into the ground and pull them back, to claw at the earth until her fingers bled and her skin was raw. She felt nothing, heard nothing, but still could not stop the screams that ripped through her throat, nor the tears that flooded her eyes.

" _HENRY!"_


	5. Chapter 5

They're gone.

They were just there, standing next to Regina as she tried to close the portal, and then they were gone in an instant.

Regina had collapsed to her knees, clawing at ground, screaming her son's name, and Robin's first instinct was to run to her, to hold her, to tell her it was okay, they'd find Henry.

But he couldn't do that, she killed his child. So what could he do? Stand dumbstruck behind his soul mate as she screamed and sobbed? Tackle Zelena and make her pay for what she just took away from Regina? He didn't know his place here, but his heart hurt for Henry, for Emma, and, reluctantly, for Regina.

She fell silent for a moment, each laboured breath echoing through the streets, before turning slowly, glaring over her shoulder at her sister, tears staining her flushed cheeks.

"You," She growled. "You. _Stupid_. **_Bitch_**!"

She sprung from her place on the ground, grabbed Zelena by the neck, and tackled her to the ground, pressing her arm to her throat until she gasped and choked.

Maleficent and Snow ran to the two, desperately trying to pull the women apart, but Zelena dug her nails into Regina's hair as her sister pushed the air from her lungs. They rolled around the pavement, kicking and scratching, screaming and cursing.

"I should kill you right now you worthless bitch!" Regina screamed as she fought against Mal, who was gripping her waist and pulling to get her off of her sister.

"You deserve it!" Zelena countered. "You took my child!"

 _"I didn't kill your baby you fucking idiot!"_

Robin's heart jumped and froze, ice shooting through his veins. Had he heard her right?

The frantic moment screeched to a halt, and Zelena gasped from under Regina's weight as she pushed on her sister's throat. Mal took the opportunity to lift Regina up and hold her in place as she gasped for breath.

"Wh-what are you… talking about?" Zelena forced out through huffs of air, lifting off the ground and rubbing her neck.

Regina was breathing heavier than Robin had realized, and her eyes were sparkling with tears that he suspected had nothing to do with her fight with her sister. He noticed how Mal never let go of her, the grip around her waist supported all her weight, and she rubbed her hand up and down her arm to calm her.

"I didn't kill your baby," she admitted as she inhaled a shaky breath. A stray tear slipped down her cheek as she looked from Zelena to Robin.

The baby was fine. Regina didn't hurt it.

He felt like he was inhaling water, like his heart was made of stone, sinking deeper and deeper to the ground with each heavy pound in his chest. He should be relieved, his child was fine, but the pain, the rage, still ached deep inside him, and it couldn't be removed so easily. It left him confused, feeling heavy and empty at the same time.

He looked at Regina, probably for the first _real_ time since she had become the Dark One. Her eyes were always an open book, a window to her soul, and he could see the torment inside her. There was a war raging inside her, head and heart clashing with poisonous darkness, and he could see how it burned behind her eyes. How broken she felt. He could see that she was in pain for what she did, if not for the way her eyes weighed with guilt, but the way her bottom lip quivered, the way her jaw slid back and forth, grinding her teeth, the way she relied on Mal to keep her upright.

She had lied to him. She had lied to him _specifically_ to break him. To make him think he had lost everything. That knowledge tore straight through his heart, both with the pain of the deception, but also with a surprising twinge of guilt. He had driven her to this; he had betrayed her trust enough that she had wanted to hurt him in return, enough that the darkness that whispered in the back of her mind had momentarily won.

But she hadn't done it.

He tried to speak, to understand the spiralling thoughts whirling around his mind, but he could only manage a choked, "You… You didn't…"

She shook her head, slow and helpless, before her eyes flashed at Zelena and burned with an undying hatred again. She pushed out of Mal's grip and straightened her spine.

"I'm going after them."

She bent down and grabbed the wand from its place on the ground, wringing her hands before she waved the wand in front of her. Just as the tip began to glow, David jumped towards her and snatched the wand out of her grasp. She turned to him, jaw clenched tightly shut as she glared at him.

"You can't open another portal, it's too unstable. You couldn't even control it."

"And what do you suggest, Charming?" She pushed closer to him, nose to nose as she stared him down. "Let them live their lives together in _another realm_? With a wraith on the loose no less."

"Can't we bring them back?" He tried, looking around the group. "There has to be another way."

"I don't have time for another way. I'm getting my son." Regina ripped the wand from his hand and thrust him back with her magic, throwing him to the ground. Snow ran to him and quickly helped him up, insisting to Regina that they could help, that they could find Henry and Emma together.

"You're not coming, I can get them on my own. I'll open the portal, step through, grab them, and bring them back."

"What if you can't find them? They could have moved, someone could find them first." Snow pleaded with her, but her desperation did little to dim the fire in Regina.

"Then you should stop holding me up."

She held her hands in front of her, and with a flash of white, the ground started to tremble, pulses of magic radiating out of Regina into the cement beneath her. A spiral of white and blue pushed out of the ground in front of her, wild and out of Regina's control. Her arms shook as she tried to steady herself, to shrink the portal to something containable.

The portal flared and flashed, fighting Regina as she threw her power into it, and the magic reached out, bursting the streetlights along Main Street, running all the way down to Granny's, where the glowing sign exploded. People began to pour out onto the street, alarmed and confused as they found lights bursting and magic raging along the street.

"What the hell is going on?" Little John ran up to Robin, carrying a frightened Roland on his hip.

"It's complicated," was all Robin could manage, and he threw his bow around his shoulder before he reached for his son, pressing him into his chest to shield his eyes from the burning bright magic. "You need to get out of here, this doesn't look pretty!"

The streets were flooding with Storybrooke citizens as Regina tried to reign in the portal, though it only grew wilder and stronger. Her brow was set and focused, but her eyes screamed in fear. Mal stood next to her, pressing a hand to her shoulder to steady her as her body swayed with the magic she was pouring out of her fingertips.

"What's happened?" Belle ran out of Gold's shop, eyed Rumple on the ground, and moved to grab him before David grabbed her.

"He's too close to the portal, you could fall in!"

"It's out of control!" Belle yelled over the growing winds. "We need to get these people out of here!"

Robin scanned the crowd, finding familiar faces amongst the masses; Grumpy, Granny with baby Neal, Will, Tuck, a few dwarves he couldn't remember the names of. Everyone was in danger, especially Regina.

Her arms were shaking furiously, her face flushed a bright red and sheened with sweat as she pushed and pushed. Her elbows started to bend, and Robin could tell she was losing hold of her magic. In a moment her eyes blew wide, terror replacing her determination, and she screamed out to anyone who could hear her.

 _"Get down!"_

She pulled her arms in, ducking low as shock of magic reached out and grabbed her, sucking her into the blazing white centre. Maleficent was close behind her, tugged in as she held on to Regina's hand.

He was running on instinct, without a split second to think a specific thought before he grabbed David and Snow, pushed them down as he pulled Roland into his chest, pressing his hand to his son's head to hold him there. He knelt, tucking Roland in as a flare of white and blue reached out and sucked him in.

Then everything went white.

:::

 _Henry_.

All she could think about was Henry.

She fell to the soft forest floor as a loud _oof_ fell from her lips, Mal close behind her as she tumbled onto Regina's back. Both women groaned as they untangled themselves to the sound of other people landing around them. She lifted her head, spotting a dark coat falling out of mid air – Hook, she realized – followed by a flash of red hair.

One by one, each member of her family fell around her; Snow and David landed on each other, Robin fell to his knees as he gripped something to his chest, rolling to keep it safe, Zelena flat on her back next to an irritated Hook, Belle clinging to a still unconscious Rumple, Granny holding on to a blue bundle that was probably Neal, even a few of the Merry Men and the dwarves fell from the sky with a grunt.

"What the hell?" Hook groaned as he sat up, rubbing the back of his head as if he'd smacked it on the ground, or worse, Zelena's head.

"Regina?" Snow croaked from somewhere behind her, shielded by bushes and tree trunks.

"I'm over here." She pushed off the ground and waved a hand in the air, holding herself up against a tree when her vision tilted and the ground seemed to come up from underneath her. Her knees trembled and she leaned most of her weight against the rough bark of the tree.

"Where the hell are we?" Zelena asked as she moved towards the scattered group. "It looks like…"

"The Enchanted Forest," Regina finished, pressing her eyes shut as a stab of pain sliced through her skull. Her head was pounding just above her left eye, and something warm was trickling down the side of her face. She reached up and pressed her palm to where her head ached but winced when the pain sharpened, pulling her hand away to find a pool of blood on her palm. Lovely.

"Oh God, Regina!" Snow shouted, running over to her when she surely noticed the red staining her face. She stumbled over a few roots as ran towards her, and moved to press her sleeve to Regina's forehead.

"I'm fine," she insisted, pushing at Snow's hands and wiping at the blood that dripped into her eye. She was a mess, and was probably rather frightening to look at; tangled long hair, skin-tight and rain-stained silk dress, running make up, and a blood covered face. She'd surely terrify Roland.

Oh God. _Roland_. He was there, tucked into his father's arms as he trembled with fear. How had this happened? How had so many people fallen into the portal? So much for a one-woman job.

"Mom?" A voice called in the distance, and Regina instantly perked up, eyes scanning the familiar green forest for a blonde or brunette head.

"Henry! Emma!" She shouted, but winced when the volume stabbed behind her eye again. She leaned heavier on the tree, breathing low and shallow as Snow stepped in front of her, watching Henry pop out from behind a far off tree. He sprinted through the bushes, jumping over fallen logs and raised roots before he threw himself into Snow's arms.

"Grandma!" He hugged Snow tight, followed by Emma as she threw herself at her father. He spied Regina over her shoulder, shouting a quick, "Mom!"

He stopped when she locked her eyes on his, and his face fell when he took her in.

"Mom you're bleeding!" He ran to her, pressed his hand under her chin as she so often did to him, and inspected the gash on the top of her head.

"I'm fine, sweetie," She promised, wrapping her arms around him and pulling him impossibly close. Her knees were still weak, and she leaned more weight on him than she normally would. Though he was growing taller and taller these days, and she knew he could hold her up.

"What happened?" He asked into her neck. "Why are you all here?"

"I was going to come get you, but the portal was too strong, and I lost control of it," Regina admitted sheepishly. Shame slid into her gut, twisting with the all too familiar pain and guilt that was taking up residence inside her lately.

"Well how the bloody hell are we going to get back?" Hook demanded as Emma ran to him, hugging him fiercely before tucking herself into his side.

"The wand, where is it?"

"Umm…" Grumpy spoke up, leaning down and pulling a snapped branch out from a bush beside him. No, not a snapped branch – the wand.

"You've got to be kidding me." Hook groaned, dropping his head back and throwing his eyes to the sky.

Regina's stomach hardened, sinking like a stone inside her. That was their only way back, the simplest way to open a portal without a magic bean or something far, far worse. They were trapped in the Enchanted Forest.

 _This is Zelena's fault. She tried to hurt Henry. To hurt you._

Regina scanned the small crowd, watched as each person rubbed their aching spots or righted their clothes, and landed her gaze on Zelena, who was rubbing her bare wrist absentmindedly.

"How did you get your cuff off?" Regina asked, and all eyes fell on Zelena.

"You all were rather occupied with your wraith, it certainly wasn't hard to find something sharp when no one was looking."

"And yet you came back," Emma noted, pinching her brow at the witch.

"What can I say," she said with a small shrug, "I wasn't done with my revenge."

"And look where that got us," Charming scoffed and rolled his eyes.

"If you'd rather, I could spare you all your judgemental looks and leave you in peace."

"Not likely," Regina cut in. "You're very much still pregnant, and though I may not have hurt your child, I did cast a rather impressive tethering spell." She felt a grin spread across her lips, cracking the dried blood still trapped along her mouth as Zelena's smirk slipped. "If you try to leave, I will _take_ the baby. And you will _never_ see your child. Ever."

She hesitated, taking in Regina's words as her eyes bounced with her racing thoughts. Finally she choked out a laugh and shook her head. "You can't do that. You can't take my baby from me."

Regina stepped closer, pushing out of Henry's embrace to meet her sister eye to blood-covered eye.

"Try me."

They stood rooted in place, silence growing thicker between them as they burned their gaze into each other. Zelena ground her teeth as she glared at Regina before she finally dropped her eyes to the dirt at her feet in silent defeat.

"So what now?" Henry asked, drawing more silence from the crowd. Regina slid back to her place next to him and squeezed her fingers around his arm lightly, pulling him closer against her side. Her vision was starting to blur, and the world was tilting at an unnatural angle, and she leaned heavier on Henry than she intended to.

"We need to get out of these woods before I fall over," she groaned.

"Here," Emma said as she stepped forward, lifting a hand to hover over Regina's forehead. A pulse of white flooded across the crimson-stained skin, and the pain in her skull sharped for a moment as the gash along her forehead knit itself together. She pinched her eyes together for a moment, and breathed a sigh when the sharp slicing behind her eye finally subsided to a dull thudding. With a quick brush of her fingers along her skin, she found no trace of dried blood, and gave Emma a small smile as a wordless thank-you.

The group stepped closer together, ready to devise a plan of action. Mal stood off behind the Charmings, the Merry Men and Dwarves kept clustered together as they came closer to the small group of heroes, and Robin shifted uncomfortably, sliding Roland from his hip down to stand between his legs while he rubbed the side of his head.

"What's wrong with R'gina?" Roland mumbled as he tucked himself further into his father's leg.

Her heart pinched as she looked at the small boy, so gentle and so afraid as he snuck glances up at her. She couldn't imagine what terrifying thoughts were plaguing his little mind as he tried to see Regina through the mask of the Dark One.

"I think we could all use a wardrobe change," Snow said, bright as always, "we stick out like sore thumbs."

"Some of us are a little scarier than others," Grumpy added, earning him a stern look from Regina.

They were right, they needed to change, _especially_ Regina.

She waved her hand and encircled herself and Henry with a cloud of purple. She replaced their clothes with something simple enough for the Enchanted Forest, something she was sure he had imagined for himself once or twice; a soft brown vest, puffed tunic, and dark pants for him, and pale purple, loosely corseted peasant dress for her.

She took her time changing each person's clothes, her magic still weak and draining, but soon enough, everyone was covered in something fitting and familiar. The Charmings were regal as ever, Hook was covered in leather from head to toe, Emma wore a pale white dress befitting a princess, and Mal was sporting a long black dress, something elegant enough that she had skipped on the horns this time around.

Regina's eyes lingered on Robin, on the way the braided leather moved up his vest, how the velvety green of his cape draped over his shoulder, or how his blue eyes sparkled against the forest around him. He fit in perfectly, completely in his element, his son and his Merry Men by his side, as he had been just a few years before.

"We're us again!" One of the dwarves cheered, patting another on the back.

"Not all of us," Zelena mused, turning to her sister. "You don't look like _yourself_ , dear." She waved a hand and covered Regina in a green cloud. Before it could clear, she could feel the tightening of her corset, the pinch of her high collar, the rise of her impossibly high heels, the pulling of the hair at her sensitive skull, the padded shoulders of her jacket, and the skin-tight leather pants that clung to her thighs.

She didn't need to look down to know she was the Evil Queen, and burned a forgotten hatred in her belly.

She loathed for Henry to see her like this, as she used to be, in all her black leather, sparkling jewel, regal glory. It had been bad enough that he saw her in the silky-smoke dress of the Dark One, but this, this wardrobe carried with it a life of sins she would rather forget that her son even knew about. A life that had been a lie, a mask to shield her from her constant agony as queen.

And now she was trapped again. Same realm, same wardrobe, same constant ache in her heart.

But now she had Henry. This time could be different.

"Well dear, two can play at that game." She waved a hand and splashed Zelena with her magic, instantly turning her skin a vibrant green. The witch screamed when she looked down at her hands, and clenched them into fists when she rounded on Regina, who stopped her in her tracks with a clenching of her own hand.

"Now, now, dear, I wouldn't do that." She stepped closer, her new height giving her an intimidation factor when she looked down at her sister. "If you don't want your baby to be born green, you'll keep quiet, and keep by my side." She grabbed her arm, waved her hand, summon the cuff to her palm and slid it into its place, locking Zelena's magic inside of her for the moment.

"You can't keep this cuff on me forever," Zelena growled.

"No, I assume I can't, but I still have leverage." When Zelena's brow rose in mock astonishment, Regina narrowed her eyes at her. "You may still be pregnant, but I am still very much in control of how long that lasts. You leave my side, so does your baby."

Zelena snapped her mouth shut, glowering at Regina as she backed up and stomped away, already testing the boundaries of Regina's tolerance.

"My majesty!" A shrill voice came from her side, and she barely had turned in the direction of the sound before a small body crashed into Regina's legs, hugging and squeezing with all his tiny might. Roland beamed up at her through his curls, dimples on full display. "You're beautiful again!"

Henry chuckled lightly as Regina's smile pinched, unable to give the boy all of the affection she truly held for him. She risked a glance over at Robin, who she found watching her intently. He didn't look quite as angry as he had, though he wasn't particularly happy either. He looked as conflicted as she felt, and she decided that they weren't in a good enough place for her to treat Roland as the sweet little boy that she loved as her own.

"I think you should stay with your papa," Regina whispered, leaning down to meet his eye level. "It's safer that way."

"But my majestyyyy," he whined, waving his arms around in adorable protest, "It's just like before, why can't I be with you like before?"

Her mind jumped back to the missing year, to endless days baking with Roland, walking through the gardens, telling bedtime stories when he became too tired to return to his own chambers with his father, who would both end up spending the night with her. More than anything, she would love this trip to the Enchanted Forest to be similar to that one, made better by Henry's presence as they worked together to find their way home. But for now, after everything she did, she wasn't sure that was possible.

"Run back to your papa, sweetie." She dropped a quick kiss on the top of his head and pretending to pinch his cheek when he pouted. "Maybe you can play with Henry if he says it's okay."

That was enough to excite the boy, and he gave Regina a rather sloppy kiss on the cheek before bounding back into Robin's arms.

Her skin flushed as she wiped the dampness of his kiss away, and turned to find Henry watching her, eyebrows raised as he grinned at her.

"My majesty?" He teased, and she rolled her eyes, fighting her own grin.

"You know, you're royalty in this realm, too," Regina reminded him, and his eyes lit up for a moment, only dying down when he pretended it wasn't as cool as she knew he thought it was. She pinched his cheek, much as she had with Roland, and whispered playfully, "My little prince."

"And what does that make Roland?"

"My little knight," She answered easily, so quickly Henry raised his brow in question. "We decided that long ago, when I first met him."

"Ah." He nodded as he smiled softly at the ground. Regina wondered what he was thinking, if he was imagining her and Roland, spending nights curled up under her tree reading a book, or her and Robin off on an epic adventure befitting royalty. She assumed his version of the Enchanted Forest was far from her reality, and it dug at her gut to know that her son had no idea of the darkness that plagued this world for her, of the misery that grew with each passing moment that she had been without him here, of the thoughts of sleeping curses or something far worse. Something much more permanent.

This world was a prison, a reminder of her lack of control over her own life, and she was the reason they were thrown back into it, this time with Henry by her side, oblivious to the pain that it brought to her heart.

A pain that would only get worse, for they only had one place to go.

"Alright everyone," Regina shouted over the low chatter of the group, "Let's get moving."

"To where?" Emma asked.

"The only place we have to go – my castle."

:::

Of course they'd go to Regina's castle. Where else _could_ they go?

It was hard enough, guts twisting with anger and guilt whenever he looked at her, but now, like this, with her in those sinful outfits with her breasts pushed ungodly high and her legs covered in shiny black leather, walking back to the very place where he'd lusted over her, watched her stalking the corridors in her rage or misery for an entire year, it was unbearable.

He was supposed to hate her, and God knows she deserved it, and there he was, following her lead – though doing a rather good job of hiding in the back of the crowd - back to the very place he'd fallen in love with her.

It _had_ to be her castle. Fucking. Perfect.

"Papa?" Roland said softly as he tugged on his father's cloak. Robin looked down to find his son pouting, his lip sticking out and a sure sadness welling in his big eyes. "Why did Regina tell me to go? She always picks me up when I hug her."

"Oh, my boy…" Robin crouched down and scooped him into his arms, holding him close to his chest as he followed the crowd trudging down the muddy path towards the castle. "Regina… she's a little… _different_ right now."

"Different how?"

Gods, how did he explain the consuming darkness that was coursing through Regina right now, all because she sacrificed herself for him? How could he tell his son that he was the reason Regina wasn't _his_ Regina anymore? How could he explain the ways they had hurt each other, how they had destroyed everything in an effort to save everything?

"I don't think I could explain it for her, I think it's best just to give her some space for a while. To let her figure everything out, yeah?"

Roland nodded and fell quiet, soaking in his father's words before whispering, "Is it my fault?"

"What? No!" Robin said quickly. "It has nothing to do with you, baby, I promise."

"Then why doesn't she love me anymore?"

Robin's heart clenched, and he sighed and shook his head. "No, no, Roland, she still loves you as she always has, with all her heart."

"Does she still love you, papa?" He asked softly, making Robin's chest ache more than he thought possible. He looked over Roland's head, catching a glimpse through the small crowd of a high collared black and purple coat billowing in the wind, and the back of elegantly styled hair, pulled tight and piled high to the sky. She was talking with Henry, holding him close as they whispered to each other, but as he watched her, she'd stiffened, muscles flexing defensively as she peaked over her shoulder. She didn't look at him, but she knew he was watching her, and as she turned away from him, losing herself in her conversation with Henry again, his heart weighed impossibly heavy in his chest.

"I'm afraid I don't know, my boy. I… I made a mistake, and I don't know if Regina can forgive me."

 _Or if she should forgive me, or if I should forgive her,_ he'd thought, but dared not to say to his own son.

Roland frowned, a heartbreaking puckering of his lips, and he tucked his head under his father's chin as he walked in painful silence.

"She looks like she loves you." Roland whispered sleepily after several moments.

Robin clenched his jaw, and emotion welled in his throat, nearly choking his words. "How do you know?"

"She just does. She gets like Mamas do when they look at Papas."

Robin chuckles at that, soft but half hearted, and tickles Roland's side. "Well she is a mama, son."

"No, no." Roland shook his head. "Mamas and Papas look at each other funny. Like how you look at Regina."

"Oh?" He leaned back to look his son in the eye, and he was all business, nodding his head and setting his brow.

"Yes. You're Papa and Mama, and she loves you."

He can't help the smile that tugs at his lips as he looks down at his sweet boy, so hopeful and sure of himself, so trusting in his family's love without a lick of understanding as to how broken it really was. Still, the smile could not reach his eyes, and hugged Roland tight when the mask of happiness cracked, unable to hold for a moment longer.

"I hope you're right."

:::

The walk to the castle wouldn't be long, several hours at most, and Regina thanked the Gods that Henry had landed in her own kingdom. They had enough issues as it was, they didn't need a several days journey on top of everything else.

Regina led the way, with Henry by her side, and Maleficent was close behind her every step of the way (she was being over protective, Regina could tell – she was watching her every move, making sure that she wasn't being swallowed by darkness, and though her hovering should have driven Regina crazy, she found herself more grateful for Mal than anything. Her presence was an extra comfort, next to Henry). Emma, Hook, and the Charmings followed not far behind, all chatting amongst themselves quietly about their time in this realm. Regina had enchanted Rumple's comatose body to hover beside Belle, who lead the rest of the group that took up the rear, with Robin and Roland at the very back of the pack.

He was doing an impressive job of avoiding her, hiding away in the back of the crowd, but she knew he was still watching her. Her spine tingled whenever his eyes fell on her, and she forced herself to ignore it, to ignore _him_. There was nothing she could do to change the anger he held for her, it was her own fault, and she could only suffer in silence.

She wanted to look, to find his gaze amongst the faces behind her, but she wasn't sure she could stand seeing the hatred he would surely burn into her eyes. Her heart ached too much, was far too cracked and vulnerable, and that would shatter her into a million pieces.

So instead, Regina distracted herself with Henry, answering all of his questions about this world as best she could, doing her best to put on a brave face when he asked about her time as queen, and laughing at some of his sillier questions.

"So what do we eat here? I remember Emma talking about something really gross, but are there other things to eat? How do we find it?"

Regina laughed softly and squeezed his shoulder. "We don't usually find it, there was a whole kitchen staff that saw to the cooking. Though I suppose that might be a little tricky now that everyone is back in Storybrooke."

"Was anyone left behind?" Henry asked.

Regina chewed her lip before shrugging. "There must have been, the curse wasn't designed to take _everyone_ , just those you wanted. It didn't take everyone the first time, I can't imagine this one was any different."

Henry paused, seeming to think about his words carefully before asking, "So if anyone is left in the kingdom, what do you think they'll say when they see you've come back?"

Regina huffed a laugh and waved a hand down her body. "Looking like this?" She winked at him, and the tension in his shoulders relaxed when he realized he hadn't overstepped in his question. "I can't imagine they'd be too pleased to see the Evil Queen again."

"But you're not the Evil Queen," Henry said quickly, seriously, and Regina couldn't help but smile at him. "And you weren't the last time you were here either."

"No, I wasn't," She admitted, "But that doesn't mean people have so easily forgiven me. I made a lot of mistakes, and wrongs aren't so easily righted." Her chest pinched and her spine tingled; she itched to look back at Robin, but she shook it off, continuing with a laugh, "Plus it's hard for them to see through all of this." She waved at her outfit again, and Henry snorted.

"Yeah, I can see what you mean, it's definitely… _something_ ," he teased, and she dropped her jaw in mock astonishment, lightly poking his side to make him laugh. They fell silent for a moment, Regina smiling to herself as they walked, and then Henry said, rather awkwardly, "So… this outfit…"

Her breath caught and her stomach rolled as her eyes slid over to Henry's nervously.

"It doesn't look very comfortable."

She laughed at that, a deep, honest laugh that she hadn't felt in… God, forever.

"It's not supposed to be comfortable. You try wearing a corset, my organs are being crushed."

"Then why do you wear it?" He asked, innocently enough. If only he knew the wounds he was digging into.

"Not for comfort, that's for sure," Regina offered with a small laugh, though it did nothing to ease the crease growing in Henry's brow. So she sighed and rubbed her palms along her sides, scratching them on the beaded surface of her jacket. "It used to be about royalty, being queen meant I had a lavish wardrobe. But after time… it became about fear, about power. This," she gestured down towards her leather clad thighs, "was intimidating. It made me feel stronger than I was."

"And now?"

She pressed her lips together before sighing softly. "Now it's a broken mask, a costume of who I used to be, of who I used to _pretend_ to be."

"Do you hate wearing it?"

The way he looked at her, how he saw right through the jewels and the make up and could read her soul, pinched something in her heart. Her boy was so much more mature than she realized at times, and understood much more than a 13-year-old should.

But he was right, so she nodded solemnly, biting back the dampness that pooled at her lashes. "More than anything." She paused, listening to the crunching of the leaves beneath their feet as they walked in silence before she asked meekly, "Does it frighten you? Seeing me like this?"

He hesitated for only a heartbeat, looking her up and down before meeting her eyes, and he quickly shook his head. "I know you're still my mom, what you wear doesn't matter."

She beamed at him, grinning from ear to ear as she roped her arm around his neck and pulled him into her, walking with their sides pressed together. How did she get so lucky to have a beautiful boy who could understand her soul, who could see through the Evil Queen at the drop of a hat? Of all the things life gave her, every day it proves that Henry was truly the greatest gift of them all.

:::

The walk to Regina's castle was certainly a slow one, a trudge verging on a crawl was more like it, but time still passed too quickly as far as Robin was concerned. Soon enough the long shining black peaks of Regina's castle came into view, and Robin's gut fell to the ground as they walked across the threshold.

Henry was bouncing with excitement, and Regina was grinning from ear to ear as she watched him race around the castle entrance, taking in all of the grand tapestries and statues before hurrying up the stairs to look down at the group below him.

 _"This is the best thing I've ever seen!"_ He yelled, and his voice bounced off of the walls, echoing in Robin's ears. He couldn't help but smile at the boy's enthusiasm; he could only imagine the thoughts racing around his mind, for he had had them once himself when he had first been inside a castle.

His gaze drifted to Regina, as it often did, and he found her looking rather uncomfortable. She still smiled up at Henry, though now that he was futher away, she seemed to have slipped into something much closer to a grimace than an honest smile. Her posture was rigid, uncomfortable, and she was pressing both hands to her stomach.

She didn't want to be here, he realized, she had hated every second in this castle during their time together, had told him about the memories that haunted these walls, her cage for so many years. But she was being strong for Henry, and Robin imagined that it truly was easier for her with him here, since he was the source of any happiness for her.

He felt a bloom of pride for her and her unyielding strength, for her need to put Henry before herself, and he smiled despite himself.

Henry ran – or practically fell – back down the stairs and slid to a stop in front of his family, his cheeks flushed and his chest heaving as he breathed heavily.

"I can't believe you guys lived here!" He exclaimed, his voice just shy of an honest yell, and he looked between Snow and Regina, who were both suppressing a laugh. He turned to Emma and beamed at her. "Is this the castle you saw when you came here with Hook?"

Emma did laugh, and answered with a smile, "One of them, yeah, or at least bits and pieces when we were looking for Snow. Though I did get a good look at the dungeon here."

"Not my fault." Regina threw her hands in the air and raised her chin regally. "You should know better than to cross an Evil Queen."

"Noted." Emma chuckled and wrapped her arm around Henry's shoulder. "Maybe the Queen should give us a tour?" She raised a brow, smiling cheekily, and Regina rolled her eyes.

"Fine, but you're sleeping in your cell."

"If you insist, your Majesty," Emma mocked with a dramatic bow, flourishing her dress at her sides, and Regina scoffed as she marched up the staircase, wordlessly urging the crowd to follow her.

"Regina, wait!" Belle yelled, and Regina stopped on the stairs to look at her. "I should get Rumple somewhere, lay him down."

"Oh, right…" She mumbled in reply, as if she had completely forgotten about the former Dark One's lifeless body. "There's a room just there-" she stopped and pointed, "-under the stairs and around the corner. It's close to the kitchens so if he wakes up and needs something you can get to it quickly. But you can have your own room, of course, up with the rest of humanity." Regina smirked as Belle hurried off, leading Rumple's floating form by his cloak until they were both out of sight.

Henry hugged Regina's side as she made a quick round of the castle, showing him the endless halls of portraits and statues, where the dining hall was, the kitchens just to the side, the ballroom (which Henry insisted they had to use, even though there were so few of them there), the gardens where Regina's apple tree once sat, and back up to the endless amount of empty rooms for bed chambers.

She led them past her room first, since it was the farthest away from the rest, and told him that he could choose whichever room he wanted. Snow and Charming would be staying in their old room, and Hook and Emma could stay just across the hall, but they were half way across the castle, and Henry insisted on the room closest to Regina's.

Robin could tell how it touched her, and she beamed as she opened the door just down the hall from hers, leading him inside and taking a moment to magically set up the room for him. The group took the invitation to disperse, and everyone separated to find their own accommodations.

Maleficent quickly disappeared to the rooms closest to the dungeons, promising Regina that she wouldn't be sleeping on the stone floor when Regina insisted that she could have a room upstairs with the rest of them. _I don't do well with heroes_ , she'd reminded her, and left before Regina could protest any further.

The Merry Men mumbled to each other about staying in the forest just beside the castle, but Robin instantly shut them down, insisting that they weren't staying long, and it was far safer to stay in the castle, what with so few people occupying it. So they chose a few rooms together, on the opposite side of the castle from the royalty, and left moments later to take a trip to the forest, for old times sake.

The dwarves took rooms down by the kitchens, along with Granny, and Regina chose a room specifically for Zelena, placing her far enough away to give herself some privacy, but close enough that she could keep an eye on her location with a quick pulse of her magic. The witch had groaned her protest of living with her sister, but Regina had simply ignored her, and Robin felt another bloom of pride for her.

As for Robin, he wasn't sure where to go. He'd have Roland, so he didn't want to choose a completely remote corner of the castle, in case he should need someone's help with him, but he couldn't possibly choose a room near Regina. He'd had his own chambers before, Snow had given him one of the larger rooms usually meant for royal guests despite his insistence that he couldn't possibly use so much space, but it was just a few corridors down from Snow and Charming, meaning he would be the closest to Regina besides Henry.

Being close to Regina's room had served him well the last time they were in her castle, since he wouldn't need to sneak past anyone and risk being caught as he slipped into her chambers for a quick shag whenever she asked. But now, he felt like he was invading her space, and how could he sleep knowing she was just around the corner and down the hall? Knowing she'd be awake all night, swirling in darkness and isolation far more than she ever had?

Sure, he was still furious with her, he still couldn't understand how she could be so heartless towards him, how she could have shattered his entire world without batting an eye, and the simple thought of it burned in his gut, flaring in his eyes whenever he looked at her. But he reminded himself over and over that her choices were not like his; her mind was poisoned by darkness that whispered in her ear, that tried to puppet her to its every dark desire.

God, what a mess they were. What a mess they had made of each other.

In the end, he had decided it was best to swallow his pride and take his old room, for Roland's sake, so he could be closer to Henry and the Charmings. So, after he watched the Merry Men hurry down the hall to get back to their forest, he pushed the familiar door open and lead his boy back to their room.

Roland flopped on the bed immediately, rolling around in the fluffy and lavish pillows and blankets the covered the feather mattress while he giggled relentlessly. Robin took in the room, realizing just how dusty the large space had become, and moved towards the wardrobe. He brushed off a few cobwebs that covered the handles and yarded it open with a cough when he breathed in a cloud of dust. The doors creaked loudly as he pulled them open, and he thumbed through the familiar clothes that spewed out of the many drawers. Everything was where he had left it, and he felt a wave of relief in knowing that his boy would have a new set of clothes to wear tomorrow, a feather bed to sleep in, and an endless supply of cookies from Granny, if she was to treat him as she had the last time they were here.

So the situation was shit, he didn't know what was going on in Regina's head, and they were stuck in the Enchanted Forest – in her castle – together, but at least Roland would be okay.

"Well, my boy, everything looks the same, doesn't it?" He turned to Roland, who snored loudly in response. He was sound asleep, half buried in a mountain of pillows, and Robin chuckled and stepped over to his baby, tucking a stray curl around his ear before placing a soft kiss on his round cheek.

"And what do I do now, hmm?" He asked to no one, and his thoughts instantly drifted to Regina.

He couldn't just sit here with nothing to do until he felt tired enough to find some sleep, knowing that Regina was down the hall without the relief of sleep to look forward to, when he could just go to her, talk to her, try to sort out whatever was going on inside her head.

He huffed out a breath, rubbed his palms on his face a few times, and moved towards the door.

"What the hell am I doing," he mumbled under his breath as he pushed the door open as quietly as he could manage with its squeaking hinges. Gods, he was just going to make things worse, he could feel it in his gut, growing stronger with each echoing step towards her door.

He considered knocking, it would be the polite thing to do after all, but he was certain she would turn him away, or ignore him, and he _needed_ to talk to her now, he needed answers for this disaster they were turning into. So he pushed the door open, clammy hands sliding in the smooth wood, and scanned the room for her.

Regina stood at her wardrobe facing away from him, in the process of lacing up the back of a floor length pastel blue nightgown, her hair free from it's tight pins and hanging loose over one shoulder. She must have heard him walk in, she probably felt him walking down the hall, and she stood taller, setting her shoulders like the queen that she was.

"Please, come in," she drawled, dripping with sarcasm as she pushed her wardrobe closed. Heat flashed in his veins as he watched her, and he willed the anger inside him to subside. He hadn't come here to yell at her, but seeing her like this, slipping into her detached Evil Queen mask as she so often had when they'd met, it infuriated him, and reminded him why he had wanted to destroy her.

He needed to get himself under control, or he was truly going to ruin everything.

:::

"You lied." Robin's voice was cold and detached, and it sent a shock of ice through her veins. She hadn't expected him to speak to her, to acknowledge her existence, ever again. But there he was, standing in the doorway of her bedchambers, pushing the heavy door shut behind him to give them privacy.

She was too tired, too empty, to defend her actions. She broke his heart, as he had broken hers, but the crack in his soul looked far less delicious without the darkness breathing down her spine, whispering in her ear, pressing against her heart. Now she felt her heart crumbling in her chest, tearing and shredding when she thought of how she had destroyed him. Guilt could kill her, and she wasn't sure if he would care.

Regina turned to Robin slowly, dropping her walls of anger and power to show him everything; the tears in her heart, the pain dripping from her eyes. He deserved to see how broken she was from what she had done, it was the least she could do.

The knit in his brow and the set of his shoulders was far less defensive than she had expected; if anything, he looked more confused than angry, like he hadn't expected her to be so guilt ridden.

"I…" she started, taking a quick breath between words, "I lied."

"You didn't kill my child," he stated, a hint of curiosity in his voice.

"I couldn't. I could never hurt you like that," she admitted. His nostrils flared and he pulled his hands into fists, an expected anger suddenly filling him.

"You hurt me _regardless_! You told me my child was _dead_!" His voice rose with each word, and something tingled up her spine, gripping and clawing at her insides.

 _He deserved it, he betrayed you._

" _You_ betrayed _me_! You started this!" Regina defended, narrowing her eyes as he stalked around the room.

"It's not a fucking competition, Regina! That's not the kind of relationship we have."

"But you can control me? Is _that_ the kind of relationship we have?"

He groaned in frustration and flexed his fingers. "How many times do we have to say we were not going to control you?!"

"Then why, Robin?" She stomped closer to him, pushing him back against her vanity as she glowered at him. "Why the hell would you want my dagger? _You_ , of all people."

"Everyone thought we could take away your temptation! I didn't have a choice, I thought I – If we could take away…"

He paused, and she took the chance to finish for him. "Take away the darkness?"

He fizzled out; the anger in him simmered to something lower and contained, but it certainly wasn't gone, not yet.

Regina sighed, letting her shoulders fall in defeat. "You can't just take the darkness away from me," She said, her voice low and sad when the heat in her tone fell flat, and she watched his eyes moving across her features. "It's who I am now."

"I don't believe that." Robin stepped closer to her, closing the space between them, pressing his chest to hers. "The darkness is controlling you, but it's not _you_."

He was wrong; he didn't know the darkness in her soul, the impulses she fought against every day of being a hero, the thoughts that plagued her mind every time she resisted the urge to snap the neck of anyone who got in her way. The darkness wasn't controlling her; it was feeding off of her. It didn't come from nowhere, it had to already exist, and it grew inside her until she couldn't see anything but the blackness of her own damn heart.

It was so much harder to fight alone, to hear her darkest desires whispered in her ear and have to ignore them, to tell herself that they were wrong. It was easier when he was near her, Robin and Henry. They made it easier to breathe, like the pressure that squeezed at her heart was loosened when she held them.

She studied his face, watched as his eyes swam with his confliction, and traced the line of his jaw, the outline of his lips, the arc of his nose. Everything about him was home, a breath of fresh air in her swirling world of smoke and fire.

"I didn't want to hurt you," she whispered as she dropped her eyes to the floor. "It was like all I could feel was anger, _hate_ , and there's this _voice_ in my head…"

His jaw clenched and he let his gaze follow hers to the floor. She glanced up and watched as he set his shoulders, and his lips fell into a stiff line. This train of thought was irritating him, she realized, and he started to radiate his anger again.

Regina stepped forward, moving around Robin to grab her dagger off of her vanity, and held it out to him.

At first, he leaned back, eyes flashing from her face to her name carved along the blade, before he took a measured breath and he shook his head.

"Take it," She insisted, thrusting the handle to his chest and holding it firmly against him. "You deserve it… after everything I did."

"Regina…" He started, taking her hand instead of the dagger she pressed into him. "I don't want you to owe me anything. We both hurt each other. This isn't how we fix it."

"I don't owe you it," she clarified with a reassuring smile. "I trust you, I _need_ you. I… I can't do this on my own. You saw how well that went." She scoffed, and the corners of his lips quirked up, the first smile he'd offered her in what felt like ages. "I want _you_ to trust _me_. And if you have this, then I can learn to control myself. And if I turn into a monster…"

She felt him stiffen under her touch, and she reached a hand up, slowly, carefully, to hold his cheek and meet his gaze.

"If I _ever_ try to hurt your children again, or anyone for that matter, I want you to destroy me."

At first, he looked like he was going to refuse her, to tell her he'd never hurt her, but she pleaded with her eyes, begging him to understand that this is what she wanted. She wanted to control herself, or be destroyed. This life, the darkness, being the Dark One without a piece of Regina left, was not what she wanted.

Robin slid his hand up to hers, covering the fingers that gripped her dagger's handle with his own, and squeezed gently, silently asking her to let go. She slipped her hand out and stepped back, giving him enough space to hold the dagger in front of him, eyes glued to the elegant carving of _Regina Mills._

She held her breath, mesmerized as his eyes floated across the jagged blade, and only released the air burning in her lungs when he slowly shook his head. He dropped his arm to his side, his fingers barely gripping the handle of the dagger, and he inhaled slowly, his gaze refusing to meet hers.

After an endless silence, he breathed a soft "No…" and let the dagger fall to the floor with a loud clatter of metal on stone. "This isn't right."

She could have sworn something stabbed her heart, icy and hard slicing through her very center, and the air hardened in her lungs. Each breath felt like a gasp of water, filling her until it welled in the backs of her eyes, but never letting her find any air.

He stepped past her, making sure to avoid touching her, and headed straight for her door, without so much as a glance back at her.

No. _No_ , he can't – this couldn't happen.

Regina only moved when she heard the heavy swinging of the door to her chambers, and she turned on her heels, racing after him into the corridor. She yelled his name and it echoed off the stone walls, but did little to slow him down.

 _"Robin! Please!"_ She choked, gasping through her tears, sucking in any air she could manage as she watched him walk away from her. As he rounded the corner, finally out of her sight, her knees gave out and she collapsed to the floor just outside her bedroom.

She wrapped her arms around herself, squeezing her cracked pieces back together, but each sob pushed her further apart, letting in all the pain that she so desperately wanted to keep out. The darkness was circling her heart, she was sure of it, and for a moment she considered throwing herself into it, letting it take over, and leave no trace of Regina behind.

Who would stop her? Who would care? The Dark One wouldn't feel pain, or care what anyone thought. She could protect herself. It would be as simple as breathing.

 _But who would protect everyone else from you?_

"Mom?"

Her head snapped up, and she looked through her blurry tears to find Henry peaking out of his room, the door cracked open enough for him to see her huddled on the floor crying her eyes out.

"H-Henry," She sniffled, wiping at her eyes as she hiccupped. "I… I'm sorry…"

Her face pinched when she couldn't stop the sobs that shook her whole body, and tears still poured down her cheeks as she dropped her face into her hands.

Henry ran over to her, threw his arms around her shoulders, and pulled her impossibly close. He didn't ask her anything, didn't say a single word, only held her as close as he could while she cried onto his shoulder.

She could have cried an entire ocean for all she knew, and her knees ached when Henry finally pulled her off the cold ground and lead her back into her room. They walked slowly towards the bed, where he laid her down and told her to scoot back so he could curl himself in front of her, pressing his face into her neck while she cried quietly.

Regina focused on Henry, on breathing in the sweet smell of his hair pressed against her nose, and the squeeze of his arms around her waist, and the small whispers of " _it's okay, Mom, I love you"_ that he gave her when the sadness would overpower her and she'd begin to weep more.

Every bone in her body ached, her heart ached, her soul ached, and each slip of darkness around her heart only pulled her in deeper, covering her world in pitch blackness that left her with nothing but her misery.

Still, she had Henry, and she thought of only him as he drifted to sleep in her arms, hoping his presence, his love, would be enough to drive the darkness from her mind, at least until morning.


	6. Chapter 6

_Hey guys, I just wanted to tell you that this may be the last chapter of OP for a while. I'm not saying I'll never come back to it, but it definitely won't be any time soon. I've taken so long to update because I have really struggled with enjoying this fic, and I have no motivation to write it, so for now, it's on hiatus._

 _It makes me sad to put this fic aside, since so many people reacted so well to it, but I gotta do what I gotta do._

 _This is a really long chapter because I wanted to fit in a lot of different scenes, so I hope you guys enjoy it, and please let me know what you think! It means the world to me._

* * *

 _"Robin! Please!"_

He should have turned around. He couldn't leave her crying like that, curled in on herself as she fell to the chilled floor. Each step further away from her cracked his heart more and more, until his sorrow was bleeding from his very soul.

He could not take her dagger; he would not let her think that she didn't have control over her own life. She could control herself, he knew that, and if he were to take her dagger she would be trapped, he would be taking away her freedom, something he knew was far too precious to someone as caged as she.

But he was just so _angry_. There had been too many mistakes made, too many hearts crushed into dust, but he certainly wasn't remedying that in that moment now was he? He could not have her dagger, but he also could not have her, not like this.

If he were to stay, he would be betraying his own heart, and in the end, betraying her yet again. All he could see was red, and to pretend otherwise, to act as though everything was forgiven, that would not be fair to either of them.

So he had left. He left her crying alone in the hall like the biggest idiot in the entire realm.

Robin rounded the corner, stopped as soon as he was sure Regina couldn't see him, and pressed his back to the cool wall as he listened to her weep. His eyes flooded with tears, and he bit his bottom lip, hard enough to taste blood, to keep her from hearing him.

The sudden creaking of a door surprised him, and he pushed himself further against the wall, cowering from whoever might find him.

 _"Mom?"_

 _Shit_. Henry.

He had to leave; he couldn't possibly stand on the other side of the wall and listen to Henry comforting Regina when that's what _he_ should be doing. God, he was an absolute ass.

Robin held his breath as he slipped silently down the hall, the sound of his footsteps overpowered by the echo of Regina's cries, and he pushed into his room where Roland lay sprawled across their bed. The sound of the door as he pushed it shut felt final as he locked himself away from the sounds of Regina's pain that were tearing at his soul.

He pressed his forehead and palms to the cool wood and took a long, shaky breath. He felt like he was going to burst, the air in his lungs was heavy and burning, the tears flooding his eyes too much to see through, though he held it in, as fear of waking his son overpowered the weight in his chest. Still, his knees bent as he fell to the floor, and he pressed his side flat against the door while he pulled his knees to his chest.

There, curled against the door, Robin let himself fall apart, and sobbed as quietly as he could manage, all while wishing he could reach out to Regina. He wanted to bury his face in her neck, to breathe in the apple and vanilla scent of her hair, to feel the softness of her skin beneath his palms, to hold her impossibly close in hopes of her mending the tears in his heart.

But he had ruined everything - he was the reason she was the Dark One, he was the reason she was in pain now, he was the reason they were falling apart - so he was stuck there, on the dusty floor, curled into a ball, while he whispered to himself over and over, in hopes that she might hear him, _"I'm sorry."_

:::

Henry looked infinitely younger when he slept, and Regina had always indulged in watching him when he was curled up in a mound of pillows and blankets, snoozing peacefully while he grew up. She had often stood in his doorway and just looked at him, drinking in every piece of him from his small nose to his curled up toes.

These days, he was surprising her every day with just how much he'd grown; when he'd stand next to her while she wasn't wearing her high heels, she'd notice that she had to look up to him to meet his eye; when he'd speak, his voice would come out so much deeper than before, occasionally cracking when he was excited about something; when he'd look at her, his eyes could see through so much more than they used to, could understand more than she wished upon him.

Her baby wasn't so little anymore, and it broke a small piece of her heart, but as she watched him sleep now, laying in bed with her, curled into her chest and softly snoring, Regina found that maybe a piece of him would always be her baby, and that might just be enough for her.

She ran her fingers through his hair, ghosts of a touch, not enough to pull him from his sleep, and hoped that, if she could have one good thing from this hell she was living, she could spend more nights like this, blissfully enjoying the mere sight of her little prince; let him be the light to drown out her darkness.

:::

Robin had had enough wallowing, had certainly cried himself dry, and had taken no time to decide that it was time for action. He needed help, and only one person in this whole realm could possibly understand the dangerous waters he was wading into.

After knocking on three different doors with no response, he finally found the right room, down a hall adjacent to the kitchen, and was greeted by a groggy _"come in"_ when he rapped his knuckles on the door. This room was similar to his own, smaller and not nearly as lavish, but had a familiar layout, which he imagined every other guest room in the castle had. A wardrobe was tucked into one corner, a small table and chairs beside a tall window, and a bed pushed against the far wall with heavy tapestry hanging around it. He saw her sitting beside the bed, back hunched and head supported on her hands as she watched Rumple sleep.

"Belle!" Robin yelled as he shut the door behind him, and Belle's head popped up, looking sleepy but alert. She must have been trying desperately not to fall asleep, afraid to miss anything that might happen to her love, if the dark circles under her eyes were any indicator. For a second he wondered when the young girl had last slept.

"Robin? What are you doing? It's the middle of the night."

"I know, I know." He waved his hands in front of him dismissively. "But I need your help, and I figured you'd be awake."

Belle rubbed her palms on her eyes sleepily and nodded before gesturing to a chair across the room for Robin to take. He thanked her, hurried across the room, and slid the chair to face hers.

"What's going on? Why aren't you sleeping?" she asked.

"Why aren't you?" He countered with a quirk of his lips. "Dark Ones keeping us up at night, hey?"

She chuckled softly, as if she was too exhausted to actually laugh, and returned his smile. "So something happened with Regina?"

"That's the understatement of the century," Robin groaned, rubbing his brow in his frustration.

"Alright…" Belle straightened her spine and nodded sleepily. "What's happened?"

Robin had never spoken so quickly in his life; he felt like his words were right at the back of his throat, begging to be spilled, and he poured everything out at lightning speed. Belle soaked everything in, nodding when appropriate and humming occasionally when he paused to breathe. It wasn't until he reached that night's events that he felt his chest tighten rather than loosen, and a lick of shame filled him when he explained how he had ended their momentary conflict.

"She tried to give me her dagger but… I couldn't take it."

"Well I don't blame you," Belle admitted with a shrug, "I can't imagine controlling her is the best choice here."

Robin nodded as he nervously twiddled his thumbs. "Yeah… so I left."

"Wait – what? She offered you her dagger and _you left_?" Belle's face fell, and Robin's guts twisted harshly.

"Yeah? What was I supposed to do?"

"Maybe try telling her 'I don't want to control you', something a little less brutal?" She pinched her brow and shook her head at him, and he felt a flare of anger mix with his shame.

"I tried that, she wouldn't listen!"

"Of course not. She's Regina." Belle rolled her eyes and sighed.

"I didn't want to hurt her, but I can't take her freedom from her like that," Robin tried to explain, but he found no solace in Belle's gaze.

"It's a little different when she _offers_ you her dagger. She's asking for help. Regina can't do this alone, Robin, I've seen what happens when you try." She looked over to Rumple, sadness and defeat clear as her eyes fell on him. "The darkness digs its claws in, its grip is too strong. And on someone like Regina, who already has so much darkness in her heart… It's not that she's not strong, or that she hasn't changed, but this… darkness feeds off of darkness. And the longer you leave her alone, the more she'll succumb to it, the more she'll want it. And once she wants it… Not even Henry could save her."

"So what do I do?" Robin asked, scooting closer to her in his seat. "I don't want to take her choice away from her, but I don't want to leave her alone."

"Then don't," She replied with a soft lift of her shoulders. "Let her keep her dagger, but stay by her side. Remind her that she has you."

"That's all you've got? Stay by her side?" Robin cocked a brow at her.

"Well, it's more than you're doing now, isn't it?"

She wasn't wrong, and it burned him the wrong way to admit it. He was being a right ass, and he knew it, but until he knew exactly how to fix things, how to sort out his own feelings _and_ Regina's, there wasn't much for him to do, not yet.

He groaned in frustration, dropping his face to his palms for a moment before scrubbing at his face.

"She'll never want to see me," Robin muttered, and Belle's face fell into something closer to sympathy before she reached over and took his hand in her own, squeezing gently.

"I think you're underestimating how much she loves you." Belle spoke so confidently, as she always did, and it sparked something in Robin's heart.

He loved Regina, and she loved him, and damn it all, he was going to fix this. He had promised himself long ago that she would never be alone again, not as long as he was alive, and he was done breaking promises.

He thanked Belle, several times, and she smiled sweetly as he pushed off the chair and headed for the door.

"Robin!" She called after him, stopping him just as he pulled the door open. "Just… be careful. It's far easier to hate a Dark One than it is to love one."

Something nervous fluttered in his chest, tightening in his throat, and he nodded

once before he left, pushing through the shaking of his insides for Regina's sake.

:::

Darkness filtered into daylight slowly, lazily, and the sunshine danced across Henry's features, painting his brown hair in streams of gold, dusting across the freckles on his nose. Regina loathed to wake him, was completely content spending the rest of her day curled up against him, brushing her fingers along his smooth skin, but as the sunlight began to pour through the far windows, birds chirping off in the distance, she knew her time was up. They had another day to face.

"Sweetheart," She whispered, her voice slightly hoarse from so long without use, and she brushed the backs of her fingers along his cheek. "Time to wake up."

Henry groaned in response, ever a teenager, and scrunched his nose when she laughed softly. "W'time isit?" He mumbled before he buried the side of his face into his pillow farther.

"I'm not sure. After dawn," She answered, and Henry's brown knit as he processed her words. Then his eyes blew wide open, suddenly alert, and he turned to focus on Regina's face.

"We're in a castle," was all he said, and the smile spreading across his face was infectious. Regina laughed again, deeper and fuller this time, and nodded as she beamed down at her boy. He practically bounced in the bed as he exclaimed, "I didn't dream it!"

"No, you didn't," Regina assured him.

Henry's smile stretched and stretched until she was sure his cheeks would ache, before it dropped suddenly, his momentary excitement instantly extinguished.

"You were crying last night, in the hall." The pain in his eyes poked at her heart, at the still open wound left by Robin's abandonment, and Regina did everything she could to hold it in, to not let Henry see how the memory hurt her.

She shook her head and placed a hand on his cheek. "That's nothing for you to be concerned about. You've already helped more than you should."

"You didn't sleep, did you?" He asked innocently enough, and Regina shook her head as the corners of her lips dipped down. "I woke up a few times, I heard you crying."

"I'm sorry," she whispered, rubbing her thumb along his cheek. "I didn't cry all night, I promise. But I can't sleep anyways." He furrowed his brow again, and she quirked the side of her mouth up in a half smile. "Dark Ones don't sleep," she explained, and the look he gave her was almost aghast.

"That blows," he said with a huff, his disbelieve and astonishment had her laughing again before she pulled him into her, hugging him tight.

"It does blow, but what blows more is early morning council meetings, so get your butt up and dressed, you're babysitting Roland today."

"What?!" Henry half yelled when she pushed him up and out of bed with her magic, depositing him on his feet beside where she lay. "I want to go to the council meeting too!"

"No, you don't, trust me," Regina said, lifting herself up to her feet too, brushing out the wrinkles in her nightgown with her palms. "It's long, and boring, and nothing you can help with. We're discussing plans for while we're here and how to get home, you can't do much for us."

"But I want to help! And I'm thirteen, I'm old enough to join a council meeting." He puffed his chest out at her, and it reminded her of when he was a toddler, insisting that he could carry the groceries into the house for her because he was a _big boy now._ It made her heart ache, but in a far better way than it had lately, so she simply rolled her eyes at him.

"If I had to wait until I was eighteen, so do you." She tried to steer him towards the door, but he held his ground, narrowing his eyes at her.

"That's not fair, you were Queen when you were eighteen."

"Details, details." She bopped her finger on the end of his nose, scrunched her own to mirror him, and softly grabbed his shoulders, directing him to the door with a quick turn and a pat on the rear. "Out, I have to get dressed, too."

"Ugh, what's the point in being a prince if I can't act like one?" He stomped towards the exit, pulled the heavy door open and turned back to her with a glare that would put the Evil Queen to shame.

"You are acting like one, princes take care of the knights when the Queen commands it, now shoo."

He flashed his eyes to the ceiling and left with a huff and a pout. Regina laughed under her breath as she turned to her vanity, grabbed her hairbrush, and started working to untangle her new mane of curls.

Each brush through her locks was rhythmic, soothing, familiar, and her mind wandered as her fingers worked expertly. Robin would be at the meeting, as he always was the last time they were here, and the mere thought had her stomach twisting in anxious knots.

She did _not_ want to see him, did not want to reopen the wounds she had spent all night weeping over, to let him see how he had affected her. But she had no choice, there were so few of them in this castle, ghosts of the last time they walked these halls, and she would surely see him everywhere. And even if there were more, if the castle was packed to the brim as it had always been, he was part of the council. He was a leader, as was she.

Her blood boiled and a familiar tingling slid up her spine, digging its claws into her heart, a mix of anxiety and fear. This was not the place for fear, for weakness. Not in this realm, filled with the ghosts of her former sins, the pain and misery that echoed off of these walls with every step she took.

She dropped her brush on her vanity and took a few quick strides over to her wardrobe, flinging the doors open with a flick of her wrist. Layers upon layers of black leather, silk, velvet, and lace poured out of every nook and cranny, and Regina grinned as she ran her fingers along the familiar, luxurious fabrics.

She would not be weak, and if there was one thing Regina Mills knew how to do, it was how to appear strong.

:::

Robin was more than surprised when he heard a knock on his door just an hour after the sun had peaked through the night sky, couldn't imagine who was up at the crack of dawn with him, even Roland was still asleep, and was taken aback when he pulled the door open to find Henry standing on the other side, looking rather irritated. His stomach fell to his feet, and for a moment he was terribly afraid of a thirteen year old. Had Regina sent her son to tear him a new one after how he had left her? Or was he here of his own accord?

He was so lost in his panic, Robin almost missed Henry's groggy "Hey, Robin, up early too?"

"Uh – yeah…" He started awkwardly, "Always up with the sun, force of habit. W-what are you doing here so early?"

"My mom sent me," He replied with a shrug, and Robin's heart skipped a beat.

"R-Regina sent you? What? Why?" Robin shook his head quickly, and took a short breath. "I mean – it's awfully early, is something wrong?"

His gut twisted and rolled, anxiety and guilt and heartbreak knotting together by the mere presence of a child. _God, get it together, Locksley._

Henry seemed to regain some of his usual pleasantness, always a beaming boy, and he shook off Robin's panic with a quick wave of his hand. "No, no, nothing's wrong. She said I'm supposed to look after Roland today, since you guys have that council meeting. The one I'm not allowed to go to," He added gloomily, rolling his eyes.

Oh thank God, he was upset about the council meeting; he wasn't there to skin Robin alive for breaking his mother's heart.

"Ah, right, the… meeting. Come in." He waved Henry inside, told him that Roland was still asleep but would probably wake up shortly and demand breakfast, and checked that Henry knew his way to the kitchens.

"Don't get lost wandering around the castle, alright? I know it's exciting, and Roland will tell you he knows where he's going, but he really doesn't, and the last thing Regina or I want is you two missing."

"Gotcha." Henry gave him one solid nod and dropped himself into a chair near the bed. He seemed far too easily convinced not to explore, for a boy who was just seeing a castle for the first time, and Robin cocked a brow at him.

"You know she'll find out if you do go exploring, right? Mums always know."

Henry smiled cheekily, caught, and tried to pull off a casual shrug. "Well I won't take Roland anywhere dangerous, responsibility and all that."

Robin chuckled softly, shaking his head, and said over his shoulder "Just don't leave the castle" before he left the room, headed towards the kitchen before making his way to the council room.

He wrung his hands nervously, occasionally sliding his sweaty palms along the smooth fabric of his pants, and willed the knots in his stomach to subside. He shouldn't be so nervous; it's just a council meeting. Hell, Regina might not even show up. It wouldn't be the first time. She frequently skipped meetings when she was particularly upset during their missing year, though she would also miss meals, and it wasn't like she would be getting any rest…

He shook his head once as he ducked into the kitchen, reminded himself to get a grip, and occupied himself with the muffin he nicked from the prep table when Granny wasn't looking.

Robin found he had a surprisingly strong memory of the layout of Regina's castle, and was pushing through the council room door in a matter of minutes. He nodded to a groggy looking Emma and Hook, who were already seated around the large circular table, and an impressively more chipper Snow and David who stood just across from them, as he munched on his muffin and took his seat.

"About time you showed up, I figured you'd be up at the crack of dawn with Regina. You early risers are crazy," Emma said playfully, and Robin resisted the urge to frown when the comment twisted his gut.

Snow looked between Robin and Emma as her brow furrowed, and she asked softly, "You two haven't talked since we got here?"

Robin's throat felt tight, thick, like the words were trapped, and he shook his head as he pursed his lips.

"I just figured it might be easier now, since… with Zelena…" She was struggling with her words, either unsure of the situation or afraid to offend, but Robin waved her off.

"We talked but… I think I cocked the whole thing up," Robin admitted as he fiddled with the remainder of his muffin, pulling bits off and crumbling them between his fingers.

David moved forward to say something but was cut off by the sound of the door creaking open, and Robin's stomach swooped before he caught sight of Granny shuffling into the room behind a huge tray of muffins piled almost as tall as she was. Grumpy trudged in behind her, already biting off a piece of his own muffin when he took a seat across from Robin.

"Here's a little breakfast for us, hot off the press," Granny almost sang as she plopped the tray on the table. "But you – " she looked pointedly at Robin, or more specifically his crumbled muffin on the table before him, " - have to respect my work if you're going to steal it behind my back."

Robin gave her a sheepish smile and nodded, taking a bite out of the remainder of his picked apart breakfast.

"Everyone here?" Granny asked as she wiped her palms on her apron. Snow shook her head before she pulled out her seat at the table.

"We're waiting for Regina and – "

The door pushed open again, and Robin's stomach twisted in time with the sound of heavy wood scrappy against stone. It frustrated him, _you can't be afraid of her, get yourself together._

But when he looked towards the door, it wasn't the dark hair and eyes he expected to find glaring at him, but rather a blonde with bright blues, sporting dark circles under her eyes.

"Maleficent," Emma finished for her mother, and Mal groaned as she sulked into the room.

"When Regina insisted that I come to these meetings, I didn't expect it to be at this ungodly hour. And the bitch isn't even here yet," she muttered as she practically fell into the chair next to Robin. The long ashy grey cloak she was wearing flourished around her, and Robin bit his tongue to hold back an amused chuckle at how put out she looked.

"I hear ya," Emma said before she looked across the table to Snow. "Where _is_ Regina? She's coming, right?"

"If she's not here first, she's not here at all," Snow said with a sad lift of her brow. Robin frowned as he thought back to their past meetings, of all the times he'd slid into this very room and found Regina pacing impatiently at the head of the table, scrutinizing him for wasting everyone's time with his tardiness, and he realized that she was right. If Regina wasn't already here, she wasn't coming.

She was avoiding him, and the very thought stung more than Robin thought it would. Sure, he was dreading seeing her too, dreaded finding the betrayal and hurt in her dark irises, to see her look at him the way she had that year, as if he meant absolutely nothing to her, but he knew he had to face it if they were to ever fix this.

But she wasn't here. She wasn't willing to face him, to burn all her hatred into him. And if anything, that certainly wasn't like Regina.

Robin was frowning at his destroyed muffin when Snow cleared her throat.

"Alright, so, this is it, I suppose. I figured we could first try to figure out what everyone's going to do while we're here until Regina, Emma, and Maleficent can figure out a way out of here. David and Killian can set up a parameter with Robin and the Merry Men, try to see how the borders of the castle have held up while we were away. Granny can be in charge of the kitchen, as always, and the dwarves and I can go out into the village, see if the curse left anyone behind like it did last time. Belle is pretty occupied with Rumple, but she's willing to watch Neal whenever we need, and Henry is probably with Roland?" Snow looked to Robin, who nodded once in response.

"We need to keep Henry occupied," David cut in. "I'm sure he's rather excited about being in a castle and the last thing we need is him bumping into anything he shouldn't."

"We'll just keep him with one of us." Snow smiled brightly as she took David's hand that rested on the table. "We can show him around, make sure he doesn't get into any trouble, teach him to be royalty."

"I think we could all use a lesson there," Emma said wryly, lips tugging into a subtle smirk.

Snow shook her head, a smile dancing along her own lips, and opened her mouth to retort, but snapped it shut when the doors to the council room blew open in a cloud of billowing purple smoke, bouncing off the adjacent walls with a loud crack. Everyone around the table jumped, and Robin's fingers itched to grab his bow on instinct, but only gripped the table when he remembered that it was not with him.

"Sorry I'm late." Regina's voice was detached and empty as she strut into the room, but Robin didn't miss the way Snow stifled a gasp when her eyes fell on the Queen.

She was covered in black, head to toe, except for the red feathers that ran down her cape. Her hair was pulled tight, piled on top of her head to fall down one side, long and loose waves hanging just past her breasts, which were also pushed as high as possible. It looked like she was wearing a corset atop her leather pants, but it was hard for Robin to tell as she marched past him, darkness swirling with darkness.

"Oh no," Mal breathed beside him, a sad and defeated thing, and it sent a flutter of fear up his spine.

Regina marched past the table, to her usual place at the front of the room - where she would often pace circles throughout their missing year – and turned to face the group, hands on her hips and a flicker of something irritable behind her eyes.

"What did I miss?" She asked, voice cool and low. It frightened Robin, more than he ever remembered being afraid of her. He had _never_ been afraid of her, he always saw through her bluster and her fire, could find the sadness and fear buried deep inside. But this, this was the strongest of her masquerades, this was the Evil Queen, void of any emotion but anger, with darkness that fed off of her pain. This is what he was supposed to protect her from, and his failure made him fear for her, for what she was giving into.

"Jesus, Regina." Emma's voice cut through Robin's inner torment. "What are you wearing?"

"Oh this," Regina said as she looked down and played with her cape, flourishing it at her sides. "Just a little something I dug out of my wardrobe. It has… _sentimental_ value," She finished with a smirk.

Robin caught sight of Snow out of the corner of his eye, her jaw clenched and her eyes sparkling with unshed tears, and Robin's thoughts drifted to Regina's story in Henry's book, the one he'd read a dozen times over, and recalled a particular image of Regina, wearing this very outfit, while Charming and Snow stood across from her, sword drawn, on their wedding day.

"You're going to scare the crap out of Henry," Said Emma, oblivious to her mother's discomfort. "Don't you have something a bit less… evil?"

Regina didn't respond, simply locked eyes with the blonde and cocked a dark brow at her, before she took a few steps, pacing a small circle. "What were we talking about?"

Snow shook her head, snapping herself out of whatever thoughts were holding her frozen as she glared at Regina, and regained her previous peppiness, even if it was a little forced. She quickly summed up the first few minutes of the meeting for Regina, and Robin took the moment to turn to Maleficent, who looked rigid and uncomfortable in her seat, intently watching Regina pacing while Snow talked.

"What did you mean?" Robin whispered, low enough that only the hearing of a dragon could catch it. "About Regina."

"This isn't good," Mal whispered back, "I've only seen her like this once before. When she came to get the Dark Curse from me."

Robin's stomach dropped, and he made a point of looking away from Mal, to pretend he was listening to Snow and Regina bounce ideas back and forth about security measures. "Didn't you know her before all that?" Robin asked, and he noticed Mal's fingers clench around the arm of her chair.

"I've known her as long as she's been the Queen. But this… this came later. This was how she protected herself from the world, when she threw herself into darkness. She used to be so small, so full of hope, and then the light in her eyes dwindled, until it was swallowed by the darkness. I hadn't seen her for a few years, after she'd killed the King, and then the next time I saw her was… _this_. I…" Mal's voice caught, and Robin darted his eyes over to her, caught her swallowing thickly and blinking her eyes quickly before continuing. "I didn't recognize her. She was all power and games, this mask she wore, and I – "

Mal was interrupted when Regina snapped at Grumpy, yelling some obscenity at him (a retort to a snarky comment, Robin was sure) and Robin felt a weight of defeat, of loss, on his chest while Mal finished.

"I lost her."

Robin frowned, and turned to look back at Mal, finding the same pain mirrored on her face, before looking back at Regina, who was standing at the head of the table, palms on the wooden surface while she stared into the dwarf at the other end.

"If you have such a problem with how I run my castle, _munchkin_ , feel free to leave!"

"It's not like I want to be here!" Grumpy fired back, pushing up from his seat to stand, though it did little to increase his height. "Especially with your newly revived evil ass in charge."

Regina's eyes blew wide and she clenched her hands on the table, but before she could raise her hand at the dwarf, Snow stood up quickly, holding both hands in the air.

" _Enough_! Grumpy, leave, now."

"You're kicking _me_ out? When she threatened to skin the dwarves alive and hang them next to the portraits in the hall?" Grumpy huffed and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Regina is the Queen and you are going to get roasted alive if you don't stop this. Now _out_." Snow pointed towards the door, holding her ground until Grumpy stalked out of the room, temper fuming as he spouted curse words – mostly directed at Regina – before he slammed the door behind him.

The room fell silent, a collective sigh amongst the group, before Hook spoke up. "Not 5 minutes and we're already kicking people out. Lovely."

Emma shook her head and tried to gather some focus. "What do we do if we do find more people? What will they think when they see… all of us here?"

"You mean when they see _me_ ," Regina said harshly, flourishing a hand beside her. "What will they think when the Evil Queen has come back, and she's _the Dark One_ to boot?"

"That's not what I meant," Emma tried, lifting a hand, but Regina cut in again.

"Don't, Miss Swan, I understand." Her tone wasn't harsh, wasn't loud, but rather quiet and contained, which made it all the more frightening. "Who would want to be anywhere near the Dark One."

Robin wasn't sure if the jab from her words was intentional, but it stung nonetheless, and he dropped his gaze, focusing on the table in front of him while he tried to push aside his shame.

"Regina – " Emma tried again, but Regina simply rolled her eyes and pushed off the table to resume her pacing.

"What are we going to do about hunting parties? We can't live off of muffins and apples forever."

"The Merry Men have already volunteer to hunt for us," Charming responded, cutting off Granny's comment of _at least they're damn good muffins._

"My men volunteered?" Robin asked quickly as he looked up and sat forward. "Why wasn't I informed?"

"Because you won't be joining them." Regina answered, lifting her chin as if she begged him to challenge her.

" _Excuse me_? I'm their leader!"

"And you have a son to take care of," Regina reminded him, not even bothering to look in his direction while she spoke. "Henry will be busy with Snow and Charming, or myself, and you can't possibly bring your son on a hunting mission."

"I thought I was to help with setting up the perimeter? Keeping watch on the grounds? Now I'm stuck here while my men are hunting _and_ protecting the castle?"

"I won't have your carelessness in charge of the safety of this castle. Or the food, for that matter."

"What the bloody hell does that mean?" Robin was growing angry, he could feel it bubbling inside him, and he itched to push out of his seat, to stand eye to eye with her while she insulted him.

"It means you've already caused enough damage to last us all a lifetime." Regina met his eye and glared at him, as if she could burn holes in his skull, and that was it. He would not take this. He stood, kicking his chair back, and planted his hands on the table, mirroring Regina.

"I haven't done anything to hurt the people here – "

"Oh haven't you?" Regina cut in, and Robin noticed how her chin shook before she schooled her features. "You have lied to me, you have betrayed me, and you have abandoned me, and I will not have someone so untrustworthy in charge of _anything_ important in this castle."

"Regina, for God sakes, is now the time?!" Robin half rolled his eyes, his rage growing with the need to defend himself. "You can't compare… you don't understand – "

"What I _understand_ is that I will not have you anywhere near anything that has to do with the safety or well being of the people in this castle for as long as we are here. Do I make myself clear?"

"No."

Regina leaned back, her jaw falling open for a moment before she snapped it shut. She was fuming, her chest heaving with every breath, and the table around her hands looked like it was smoking, as if she was scorching the wood with magic that she was resisting the urge to throw at him. She looked like she wanted to kill him, and the sight of her both infuriated him and stabbed at the wound in his heart. He had hurt her; so badly that she could no longer trust him, but she was being ridiculous, couldn't she see why he did this?

"No?"

"No." Robin repeated, holding his ground. "I will not be benched because of something we haven't had the chance to talk about yet. If you'd just let me explain…"

"You've done _plenty_ to explain, and I am done listening to you."

"Regina…" Snow spoke up, trying to talk her down from her spiraling temper. "Robin is the most skilled of the Merry Men, to leave him here, to not use him – "

 _"I am the Queen!"_ Regina screamed, sending a pulse of magic through the table to rock the table and shake the walls around them. She was trembling, pushing her breath through her teeth while her eyes moved from Robin to Snow. "This is _my_ castle, I am in charge! And if I say the thief stays in the castle, _he stays in the fucking castle!"_

Before she could say another word, Regina disappeared in a cloud of swirling black and purple, leaving the air electric and heavy in Robin's lungs. His anger dwindled, falling into more of a burning ember than a full on fire, and the weight of defeat was back on his chest.

He had done it, he had cocked everything up enough that not only did she want nothing to do with him, she didn't trust him at all.

He wasn't sure what was worse, the pain from truly breaking her heart, from pushing himself from her life completely, or that he allowed her to fall into this darkness alone, to let herself become a home for nothing but rage all over again.

The group sat in stunned silence, everyone still holding their breath, before Mal scoffed and let out a simple, "Well that went well."

:::

Who did he think he was? Acting as if _she_ was doing something wrong, when _he_ was the one that abandoned her? She bared her soul to him, offered him everything she had, and he walked away, this was _his_ fault. He had no right to be cross with her, or to criticize how she acted, when he was responsible for it.

Regina fumed for hours, storming laps around her chambers, stomping and muttering and occasionally grabbing something from her vanity to smash it on a wall across the room.

"Yikes, I don't think you'll find pixie marrow quite so easily again." Rumple – or rather the Rumple that tormented her mind – giggled from the corner of the room where he was sprawled across her bed.

"Go. Away." Regina growled as she slowed her pacing to grab the cup off of her vanity, taking a long pull of her wine. She'd started slowly emptying a tall bottle of red as the sun had set, had been drinking for the past hour as she stewed in her bitterness, and the warmth spreading in her belly was doing little to quell the fire in her blood.

"You're rather worked up over this thief," Rumple continued, "Considering he left you, you might want to move on."

"He didn't leave me, it's… complicated." Regina huffed and rested a hand on her hip, gripping the beads of the corset before she ruffled her large skirt in her irritation.

She had been angry, but she didn't _want_ to be angry, and when she had returned to her chambers and looked in the mirror, she hated what she saw. The black leather and tight hair, the red feathers and the dark makeup, it only made her rage grow, made her fall further into the darkness. So she changed, in a puff of smoke she replaced the black leather with a heavy skirt and beaded corset, all in a deep blue that had shimmering specks of green and gold in the light. This dress was one of the few she owned that didn't have a high collar, though the skirts were driving her to madness as she paced around her room, each step getting clumsier with each glass of wine.

And if the colour reminded her of Robin's eyes, well, no one was there to know that, now were they?

"Didn't you sacrifice yourself for him? And now you're refusing to speak to him? Seems like a waste of time, if you ask me."

"Good thing I didn't ask you," Regina snapped and took another drink, all while Rumple giggled maniacally.

"Funny thing is…" Rumple pushed off the bed and stalked towards her, a twinkle in his eye and a bounce in his step. "Sometimes things have a way of working out in the end. You try to change the future but… well, some things just can't be stopped."

Regina swallowed thickly, the smooth wine turning to tar in her throat, and she placed the cup down with a shaky hand before she gripped the edge of the table to steady herself.

"What are you talking about?"

Now it was Rumple's turn to pace the room, and each step around Regina taunted her. He giggled relentlessly, as if he knew a secret that he was desperate to share, and he drummed his fingers together as he spoke. "You stopped your true love from dying. But who's to say he won't still die?"

Regina scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Oh please, you can't fear monger me into doing _anything_."

"I don't have anything I want you to do, dearie," Rumple said, almost impatiently, "Other than to embrace who you are, and to understand that you can't change it."

"I decide who I am!" Regina yelled at him and stepped closer, jabbing a finger towards his chest. " _Not_ you!"

Rumple didn't so much as flinch, only smiled devilishly up at her as she fumed. He spoke slowly, precisely, as he stared into her eyes. "The fact remains, you plunged yourself into darkness to save your _twoo love_ , but some things _cannot_ _be changed_."

Regina held her breath, uncertain of her thoughts as they swirled around her mind slowly, as if through molasses, while Rumple continued, mirroring her as he jabbed a bony finger into her chest.

"You have always been dark, you can not change that, and you've only made it worse by trying to stop something that will happen regardless."

"Robin will _not_ die," Regina said firmly as she finally turned away from Rumple, pressing a shaking hand to her stomach.

"And you suddenly care about his well being?" He asked with his usual dramatic flare. "Anything can happen, dearie. It's a shame you'll never know."

Something clicked in her mind, something sharp and vivid through her slow churning thoughts, and her heart skipped in her chest.

 _If only you could see the future._

Regina bolted out the door, but not before she could grab her dagger and slid it into the ties at the back of her waist, and made it halfway down the hall before she paused, rethinking her actions. It was late now; everyone was probably finishing up their meals in the dining hall, which was directly beside Rumple's room. She didn't want to be interrupted, was far too focused on proving the voice in her head wrong, and couldn't risk running into Snow, Emma, or, worst of all, Robin.

So she enveloped herself in a purple cloud, dropping herself softly just inside Rumple's room. Besides his unconscious form lying on the bed, his chambers were empty, dark and frigidly cold. Belle must have left several hours ago, and she could return any moment. Regina had to be quick about this.

She approached his body, inched forward at slug's pace, afraid that even the click of her heels might stir him. Once she stood over Rumple, her eyes fell on his face, on his closed lids, and a wicked grin slid across her lips.

"You have something that I need, dearie." She spoke softly, barely there, and yet her throat felt raw and tight. "I need to keep my family safe, and to do that…"

Regina leaned forward, running her palms down his arms until she could pull both of his hands up in her own, squeezing tight.

"I need to see the future."

She closed her eyes as she pushed her magic into her fingertips with all her strength, and she gasped when something electric shot out of Rumple's hands into her own, shooting up her arms and into her chest. She felt a sharp burning against her back, her dagger pulsing heat and magic into her spine, and her eyes snapped open when she let out a pained shriek.

An unnatural brightness flooded Regina's vision, and she became unsteady on her feet as the darkness of Rumple's chambers swirled into something else, something familiar and yet different. Rumple's hands slipped from hers as she tipped over, and she felt her shoulder crack against the hardness of the floor beneath her, though in her mind she kept falling, tumbling further and further until she was dropped into the chaos of what could be, and what will be.

:::

 _She's standing in her office in Storybrooke, red light tinting the blacks and whites that make up the décor. She's not alone, and she's afraid. A flash of white light, brighter than any she'd ever seen, erupts before her, slicing through the air directly for her heart, and she throws her hands up to shield herself._

 _But then Robin is there, throwing himself in front of her, arms outstretched as the light pierces through his chest before it is absorbed into him. He sputters as he turns to face her, one moment he is there, and then a flash of white blinds her before a silver slice of a sword cuts through the air where Robin had stood._

 _Regina looks down at her hands as they drip blood, pouring a pool of red to the tiles at her feet. It's not her blood, she has no wounds, and yet it drips and drips, sliding down her arms until there is no light-coloured skin left, only a deep blackish red._

 _Another flash, and there is a baby before her, nestled in a basket and swaddled in pink._

 _Her sister's voice echoes in her mind, "I can only think of one name that's fitting – Robin."_

 _Robin stands before her again, though he also lays at her feet, crumpled and lifeless. This Robin is light, pure and clear, and he stretches out an arm, moving to brush his fingers along her cheek before he slowly trickles away, turning to dust before her eyes._

 _"Regina, you are my future."_

 _And then he is gone, only the Robin at her feet remains. She drops to her knees, takes his face in her hands, and rocks back and forth, pulling him as close as she can manage as she whispers to him, "please no, come back to me, don't leave me."_

 _Darkness flashes through her surroundings, and suddenly she is standing in a clearing, green grass soaked with rain, grey clouds glooming overhead, threatening to pour down on her._

 _She feels a slice through her chest, white hot as it sucks the air from her lungs, and she looks down to find the blade of a sword protruding from her chest. There is someone behind her, holding her in place as they shove the blade in further, all while whispering in her ear, "long live the queen."_

 _Then the sword is gone, and her chest is clear, covered in black velvet over black cotton. There is a coffin before her, elegant dark wood adorn with rose-covered arrows._

 _Robin appears before her, bow drawn and arrow pulled tight to his nose, but is replaced in a flash by Roland, his own arrow tucked in his little glove, a rose tied to the very tip._

 _She's holding Roland's hand, telling him that he will always be hers, but he slips away from her, his tiny fingers tugged out of her own as she reaches for him, tries to hold him closer._

 _Henry replaces Roland, though he is so much smaller than he should be, and he's screaming at her. She's a monster, she's not his mother, and he hates her. He shifts, one moment he's the little boy who called her mommy, the next he's the teenager who pulled her off of the castle floor, but he never stops screaming, never stops tearing into her heart._

 _A menacing laugh cuts through her thoughts, deep and throaty, as if from death itself. The Evil Queen laughs and laughs while Henry shrieks._

 _Her chest feels tight, and starts to burn. There's no room, it's too full, too many pieces, too many thoughts in her head, and she claws at her chest, trying to release the pressure. There's so much pressure. She digs her fingers into her chest, her neck, her face, digging and pulling, until something snaps and tears free, setting her nerves on fire. She screams, strangled and agonizing, as she is sliced in half._

 _The pain comes to an abrupt halt, and she feels light, as if she might float away, while darkness swirls through her vision, voices bouncing through her mind as the world tips, dropping her, letting her fall into nothingness._

 _"Did you really think it would be that easy?"_

:::

She didn't want to see this, but she had realized it too late.

Everything was a jumble, one image flashed before her eyes just long enough for her to try to grasp it before it switched to something else. Moment after moment blended together, incoherent and messy as it blurred across her vision, blinding her.

She couldn't see anything, not from the real world at least, her eyes were blocked by visions of what could have happened and what was yet to be.

Rumple had been right. Robin could still die.

She had to get to him, right now, he could be dead for all she knew, but she couldn't see anything. The walls were swirling, grey and black stone tilting and spinning as she stumbled down the corridor, tripping over her own long dress and high heels. Her breathing was shallow and burned in her chest, her vision blurred with the tears that stuck to her eyelashes.

 _He's not dead, he's not dead, he's not going to die…_

Regina gasped for air as her legs pushed her forward, heels clicking loudly, echoing through the empty castle with each heavy step. Everything was blurry lights and spinning darkness, and she tipped into wall, cracking her shoulder against it before she gathered her strength and pushed herself further. Her knees felt shaky as she approached his door, and she dropped her weight on the handle, swinging it open with her whole body. It was too much, and the door fell open and bounced off of the wall with a loud bang.

She couldn't make out anything in the room, could only feel the bending of her knees, the drooping of her eyes, and something warm trickling down from her nose, as she forced his name out through the burning in her lungs.

 _"R-Robin?"_

The ground came up from under her, and her head smacked against the hard surface, plunging her into darkness.

:::

He was sprinting, or at least trying to – he was moving as fast as he could, slipping around every sharp corner and swaying when Regina's weight pulled him down - and all he could think about was how much he hated her dress.

Robin had forgotten just exactly how ungodly the outfits of this land were, with their extravagant beading and layers of tulle and silk and velvet and God knows what else, all pulled tight with a vice of a corset. It was a marvel women could even breathe, let alone move in the damned things. But he had become quickly reminded of that particular pain when he scooped Regina into his arms, pressing her head into the crook of his neck, and rushed out of his room as quickly as he could with her layers upon layers of dress weighing him down.

Despite the pools of fabric that she was swimming in, she felt incredibly small in his arms. Her hair had fallen out of its tight pins when her head had connected with the hard ground and was now hanging loose over his elbow, her hands dangled lifelessly at her sides, and her knees felt boney as they hung over his other arm. She was too small, too fragile, and the sound of her head cracking against the floor echoed in his mind, his fear only made worse by the trickling red trail from her nose that was slipping down her cheek and staining his collar.

Robin couldn't imagine what had happened, what she had done to herself to have her sprinting into his room as she collapsed, but any anger left inside him had been snuffed out by the sound of her skull bouncing off of stone.

He was running mindlessly, letting his memory guide him through the endless halls as he clung to Regina, his grip on her so hard he would have sworn she'd wince, or at least flinch as his fingers dug into her shoulder and knee. He just needed to find someone, _anyone_ , to help her.

 _She's not going to die, she's not dying…_

When he saw the familiar tall door of the dining hall, Robin turned and threw his back against the wood and stumbled into the grand room, nearly tripping before he caught himself, pulling Regina even closer to protect her should he slip.

" _HELP!"_

He shot his eyes around the room, but everything was blurry and swirling, and he couldn't make out a single face. He fell to his knees and cradled Regina the best he could, wrapping his arm around her waist as he let her legs drop to his lap.

"Robin!" He heard Emma shout, followed by a cluttered screeching of multiple chairs being pushed backwards.

"What – _Regina_?" Snow's voice sounded over several others', all confused and alarmed.

Robin pulled Regina's face into his view, pressed his palm to her cheek, and raked his eyes over her features. Her skin was ghostly white against the flare of red trailing down her face, eyes still firmly shut, though they looked like they were fluttering beneath her lids, moving rapidly but seeing nothing.

He forced his eyes away from her face when he felt a hand squeeze his shoulder, and looked up to find a small group circling him. Emma was kneeling beside him, one hand on his arm, the other squeezing Regina's fingers. Snow was kneeled beside her, with Charming and Hook standing above them, and just behind the two men, a very shocked and frightened Henry stood amongst a few of the dwarves.

"Robin!" Emma shook his arm, and he darted his eyes over to her, trying to focus her face as his vision blurred again. He hadn't even realized he was crying, but his tears slipped down his cheek and fell on Regina's face, slipping along the blood still trailing down her cold skin. "What happened?!"

"I – I don't know! She practically fell into my room and just collapsed, she's freezing and she's bleeding and I don't know what happened –"

"- Robin! Breathe!" Snow almost yelled at him, and his breath caught as he nodded quickly. "Pick her up off the floor, lay her on the table."

Robin did as instructed, with a little help from Charming and Emma when his limbs proved far too shaky, and Regina was laid across a nearby empty table, Robin standing just above her head with his hands pressed to her shoulders.

"What's wrong with her?" Henry asked, and he cleared his throat when he was unable to hide the crack in his voice. He looked to Robin expectantly, his eyes shining with his fear, and Robin clenched his jaw and shook his head.

"Doc, can you get me a wet cloth?" Snow shouted to the dwarves behind her, and a few of them hurried off together, returning moments later to give Snow the cloth, who wiped at Regina's face, cleaning any trace of blood off of her. This was better, Robin thought when he lifted his chin to look at Henry, he didn't need to see his mother in such a state, but at least now she wasn't quite so terrifying.

"She's freezing," Snow said softly as she pressed the back of her fingers to Regina's cheek.

"She's… twitching," said Emma, and she pushed Regina's long lacy sleeves up, laying her hands flat on the table. They all held their breath as they watched her fingers slightly clench and unclench on the smooth surface. Emma wrapped her fingers around Regina's wrist and squeezed, lightly at first, then with a little more force and a soft shake behind it. "Regina…"

Robin followed her lead and lightly shook her shoulders, still afraid to jostle her head but desperate to wake her up. "Regina, love, wake up… please, Regina."

"Look at her eyes," Snow said suddenly, and Robin focused on Regina's lids. They still twitched as if she was moving her eyes beneath them, but far faster than before, so fast she couldn't possibly have seen anything were they open. Her breath was coming faster, too, short and quick puffs of air were pushing out of her nose, and her chest was straining on her corset with each short inhale.

"Regina…" Robin tried again with a quick shake before he moved to the side of the table. He could see her face more clearly as he pressed both palms to her cheeks. "Baby, please wake up."

Regina's lashes fluttered, and her mouth fell open just enough for Robin to see the rapid movement of her lips. She was muttering under her breath, something so hushed he couldn't make it out, and her eyes were rolling back in her head, just the whites visible under her flickering lids.

"Someone get Maleficent!" Emma yelled over her shoulder to anyone who would listen, and Robin was certain the few dwarves shuffled off together.

He looked up for a moment, panicked eyes meeting each fear-stricken face above him, as he tried to process what to do. Henry was tucked into David's side, hugging him tightly as he watched his mother helplessly, while Emma and Snow muttered to each other, each offering another absurd idea of what could be wrong with Regina. Some kind of illness, a curse, a poison of her own making. Each mumbled word left him more lost, and he dropped his forehead to Regina's, whispering against her skin, "Please come back to me, don't leave me."

He pressed his lips to her cool skin, holding there for only a moment before Regina jerked and gasped beneath him. Robin shot back up as Regina coughed and choked back to life, and the group breathed a sigh of relief. Everyone began speaking at once, words tripping over words as they each tried to ask her what happened and if she was okay.

Her breathing regulated slowly, each gasp a little smaller, a little smoother, as she focused on Robin, and Robin alone. Her eyes sparkled with tears, a few slipping down her now flushed cheeks, and the emotion he found in her gaze was a mixture of relief and fear, something he couldn't quite pinpoint. She looked relieved that _he_ was alright, as if she was just as terrified as he had been, and she squeezed his fingers with more force than he expected, like she was terrified to ever let go again.

The chaos echoing around them only grew when the dwarves ran back into the dining hall with Maleficent and Granny close on their tail, but there was a haze around the two of them, as if they were alone amongst the frantic crowd, the sounds just a distant buzzing in their ears. For that moment, Robin could only see her, the sparkle in her eye, the relief in her smile, the pink of her cheeks.

Granny started barking orders, instructing everyone to help Regina get to her own room and a proper bed, and before they could all move to pick her up, she lifted a weak hand to run her thumb along his stubbly cheek as she breathed, "I love you."

:::

They were fussing over her, relentlessly, and it drove Regina to madness.

It's not that she needed it, she was fine. Her brain felt like it was going a mile a minute, and her limbs felt like they were made of out lead, but she was fine. Or she would be, soon enough.

She didn't deserve this from any of them, and it left her with an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. Ever since she had become the Dark One, Regina had been flopping between destroying everyone's happiness and trying to rein in her darkness, to be herself, and she'd been failing miserably. She'd snapped on everyone, had locked herself away in her chambers the entire day, and then became a seer out of pure spite. She was a mess, and a royal pain in everyone's ass.

Still, they fussed over her, took the time to damn near carry her up to her chambers and deposit her in her bed, allowed her a moment to change her clothes before Henry tucked her in and tested her temperature at Granny's request, while Snow and Emma drew the curtains over her windows. Robin hovered behind David and Hook, who all seemed at a loss when it came to helping the women who were busying themselves over Regina, and Mal leaned against the far wall, arms wrapped tight over her chest while she brooded in solitude.

Eventually, Regina insisted that she was fine, and that she just needed to rest, and promised to explain everything to them in the morning if they would just leave her alone. They relented, and one by one left her in peace.

Try as she might, Regina couldn't help the sadness that tugged the corners of her lips as she watched Robin follow Snow and David from the room without so much as a second glance in her direction, and she slumped down into her bed, mussing up the blankets and pillows Henry had fluffed up for her.

"You're sure you're alright?" Henry asked her, so full of love and concern that it had Regina welling up when she nodded and insisted that he go, that she could find him later. He had dropped a kiss on her forehead and turned reluctantly to leave with Emma and Hook.

She was nearly alone, save for Maleficent, who still leaned against the wall, stiff and curled in on herself, as far away from Regina as possible.

"You're mad at me," Regina stated, eyes falling to her lap where she fiddled with the blankets under her fingers.

Mal did nothing to respond, simply stared at the floor, and Regina could have sworn she didn't hear her. Though she knew that wasn't true, Mal heard everything, whether she wanted to or not. It was the dragon in her.

"I know I should have come to you," Regina tried again, lifting herself up to sit upright on the bed and groaning when her muscles burned in protest. "I just… never know what to say."

"If you think I'm mad at you for avoiding me all day, try again." Mal huffed as she finally pushed off of the wall and moved towards the bed, where she lowered herself to sit next to Regina's outstretched feet.

"I… It can't be easy being here, with all of these people, with me, while your daughter is back in Storybrooke." Regina couldn't meet Mal's gaze, and instead focused on pulling at a loose thread in her quilt while she spoke softly, genuinely, for the first time in what felt like ages. "I've caused so much pain because I can't control the voice in my head, I've been so wrapped up in my anger, I can't bare to think about what you must be feeling… because of what I've become."

"Regina." Mal's voice was quiet but stern, and Regina's eyes lifted slowly to hers. "I'm mad at myself," she said simply, with a hint of an awkward smile, and Regina's lips parted in her surprise.

"What?"

"We've been down this road before, little one. I've watched you slip into darkness before, at the hands of that little imp, and I did nothing to stop you. I lost you to the Evil Queen." Mal swallowed heavily, took a steadying breath, and continued. "When the princess told me you became the Dark One I could barely believe it because… I just got you back. But it sounded like the kind of idiotic thing a hero would do," She added with a smile, and Regina couldn't help but roll her eyes.

"I can't let you disappear again," Mal went on, leaning forward to take Regina's hand. "I don't blame you for where we ended up, I wanted to help you in my own way, but I'm watching you slip away again and…" She shook her head and inhaled a shaky breath that surprised Regina. "You just scared me, that's all. So no, I'm not mad at you for what happened with Lily. I'm mad at myself for letting you do this alone."

Regina wasn't sure whether she should smile or cry, and was about to do both before Mal leaned over and pulled her into a strong hug. It reminded her of long ago, when she was a lonely queen who sought comfort from a fierce dragon, and for a moment something flashed across her eyelids, a vision of Regina clinging to Maleficent, sobbing and screaming as she tried to hold herself up, but she pushed the sight away.

"Lily," Regina breathed into Mal's hair, lifting her fingers up to stroke the blonde curls, and she felt her shoulders bounce as she laughed.

"That's her name."

Regina chuckled, squeezing Mal's shoulders a little tighter. "I know. We haven't talked about her. It's a beautiful name, just like her." She pulled back and slid her fingers down Mal's hair, fixing the few strands she had tangled.

They were sitting closer now, Mal had scooted forward to wrap her arms around Regina, and now their hips were pressed together, hands tangled on both of their laps, and Regina welcomed the warmth and comfort that radiated off of her friend. She had been so alone, so lost, and had thought she could never find comfort in anyone but Henry again. But oh how she missed Mal, how she loved to have her near, and the warmth that spread through her chest helped release the fear that was constantly tightening in her lungs.

She trusted Mal, in her own way she loved Mal, and it was an easy decision to make when Regina finally whispered the words that were on constant repeat in her mind.

"Robin might die."

Mal narrowed her eyes, but didn't say anything, and Regina knew she had to continue.

"I took Rumple's seer powers, that's why I passed out."

"What?" Mal half shouted as she leaned back, cracking the tender moment into a thousand pieces.

"I – I made a mistake. The stupid Rumple in my head was mocking me and I wanted to prove him wrong and… Robin might die." Regina felt vulnerable and weak, and she pleaded with her eyes for Mal to understand, to not resent her as she slowly became more and more like the monster that Rumplestiltskin had become.

Maleficent leaned closer, inching her face towards Regina's, but she stiffened, clenching her jaw. "We have a visitor."

Regina furrowed her brow, she hadn't heard anyone enter, but curiosity had her lean past Mal and look towards the door. Before she could see who it was, she heard his voice, and her heart jumped in her chest.

"I suppose I can blame that on dragon hearing."

Mal snorted a low laugh, and sat straighter before lifting off of the bed entirely. "Maybe you're not as stealthy as you believe, thief."

She stepped towards Robin, so graceful she appeared to float, and stopped in front of him, taking him by surprise. She set her shoulders, and though Regina could no longer see her face, she was certain Mal was scowling at him when she practically growled, "Don't hurt her."

Robin stood his ground, unmoved by her show of defensiveness; though Regina was certain that the comment got under his skin by the way he clenched his jaw and flexed his fingers.

"Never again, I assure you."

Mal nodded in response, and turned back towards Regina, promising to see her tomorrow, and left them to their privacy.

For a moment, the air between them felt more awkward than it ever had. She knew he had tried to help her, that he had pulled her back from her fit of visions, but he still looked uncertain, uncomfortable in her presence, and she feared that perhaps he hadn't quite forgiven her, and he was just looking out for her wellbeing out of habit.

There was no use in hiding the shame, the guilt that was tearing apart her insides, and she slumped her shoulders, dropping her gaze to her lap in defeat. Let him tear a strip off of her, she deserved it.

"Don't ever do that to me again," He said suddenly, his voice stern and yet shaky, laced with fear. Her eyes flashed up at him, and he was frowning, almost grimacing, as he looked at her, the pain in his eyes was enough to dig into her guilt further.

A shaky "What?" was all she could manage, every inch of her frozen and waiting.

Robin inhaled a slow, steady breath, and let out a choked sigh before whispering, "I thought you died."

Regina's heart was pounding in her chest, thudding in her ears so hard she could barely hear him, and she hadn't realized she was holding her breath until she let out her own choked exhale.

"I thought I lost you, and I can't do that again, I can't…" He moved suddenly, quickly, too quickly for her to process, and in an instant he was on top of her, crashing his lips to hers.

The moment his skin connected with hers, her eyes blew open, and her sight was covered by a vision of Robin collapsing before her, choking and gasping as crimson stained his white shirt, oozing onto the floor, her hands, covering everything in his blood. She could feel her heart racing, the panic as she pressed on his wound with trembling hands, and she could hear herself whisper under her breath, _"no, no, no, no."_

Regina tore her lips from Robin's with a loud gasp, and she buried her face in her pillow as she shook her head.

"Whoa, whoa, I'm sorry," Robin said gently, rubbing his hand up and down her arm to sooth her while her whole body trembled. "Hey, it's okay, it's okay."

She couldn't find her words, couldn't possibly explain everything to him now, and took a moment to gather herself, to shake off this fear that was plaguing her every moment since she'd touched Rumple.

Robin tried to calm her, to reassure her that everything was okay, but as she continued to cower from him, his slow rubbing hands eventually stopped, and he lifted himself from the bed.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have… I can go."

"No!" She bolted upright and reached out to him, wrapping her hand around the fabric of his sleeve at his wrist. "Please, I'm sorry, I just… I can't explain it right now."

He nodded, moved closer to her, and tilted his head as he asked, "Do you want me to stay?"

Regina fell silent, her shakiness started to subside, and she slid herself back along the bed in response. He toed out of his boots and slipped into the bed beside her, instantly wrapping his arms around her shoulders and pulling her into him. She was afraid to touch his skin again, afraid to have him too close and throw herself into that swirling jumbled world without a way out this time, but when his fingers grazed her collarbone, nothing happened, so she buried her face in his chest and breathed him in.

He was home in every sense of the word; her body fit against his seamlessly, his warmth became hers, and when she was wrapped in him she had never felt safer. She had been reckless, more than once now, and to ever deny herself his security, to be so weak when she had someone so strong beside her, seemed beyond ridiculous now. He was her home, he was her support, and she needed him to get through this.

Robin threaded his fingers in her hair, kneading and massaging at her scalp as he held her close, and she heard his breath catch before he whispered a sad "I'm so sorry."

"We've both made mistakes," she reminded him, "I think it's time we forgave each other."

"I was so scared today, it was like nothing else mattered, I just couldn't lose you." His voice shook, and his chest started to tremble against her forehead. He was crying, pressing his tears into her hair, and she couldn't bare it. She squeezed her arms around him, pulled him as flush against her as she could manage, and let him pour all of his fear and misery into her.

Regina lifted her chin slowly, careful to avoid bumping him, and looked up into his eyes, red rimmed and bloodshot, shining through his streaming tears. She cupped his cheek with her palm and pressed her nose against his, muttering a soft "I love you" before she pressed her lips to his.

He was still shaking, his breathing erratic, but he kissed her back in earnest, hot and sincere as he poured his emotion into her. She parted her lips against his, her tongue warm and welcome when it tangled with his, and they drank each other in, tenderness turning to desperation as they savoured what they had thought never possible again.

There was a normalcy between them, despite the new magic that flooded Regina's veins and the pain that ached in every muscle, they connected as they always could, and soon hands began to wander, slipping under clothing before it was removed completely, baring themselves to each other.

"I love you," Robin mumbled into her lips between kisses, "I love you no matter what." His words of adoration, the intimacy as he caressed her skin, stoked the warmth in her belly all while blooming something in her heart. His touch was insistent but gentle, as if he was trying to memorize every inch of her with his fingertips, and she felt extremely close to him, connected in more ways than she could properly describe.

His fingers danced across her belly, tickling the sensitive skin along her sides, and stopped just short of her breasts. He hesitated, afraid to push her too far, and Regina giggled before pushing his hands to cup her breast. Robin groaned as he filled his hands, plucking her nipples and pulling short gasps from her lips.

His want, his _need_ , was evident as he ran his hands along her, squeezing and pinching at her, and it flipped a switch inside Regina, made her feel a little more like herself, someone sassy and bold.

"I love…" She leaned forward to suck on his bottom lip before trailing hot open-mouthed kisses down his neck. "When you touch me."

Robin shivered when her breath ran across the wet skin of his neck, and he squeezed her breast harder, twisting the nipple and making her groan into the crook of his neck.

"Do you, now?" He teased, and Regina hummed in response, kissing her way down his neck to his collarbone just to trail her tongue back up. "And where do you love to be touched?"

He trailed his palms down from her breasts, sliding along her sides until he could grab her rear and squeeze, and it pulled a rather undignified squeak from Regina.

"Here?" Robin asked, and Regina grinned into his neck as she trailed her tongue down to his shoulder, leaving a kiss there before digging her teeth into the skin when he suddenly slipped his hand around and trailed a finger through her folds. "Or here?"

"Is all of the above an option?" She replied, and he laughed softly before wrapping his hand around her again and tugging her towards him, pressing her torso flush against his as he captured her lips.

"I only have so many hands, love," He mumbled against her mouth between heated kisses, and she laughed against his lips before nipping at the bottom one.

Regina wrapped her leg around Robin's, hooking her calf behind his knee, and ground her hips into him. She could feel him beneath her leg, already hard for her, and just the thought of him aching and ready had her stomach fluttering in warm arousal that pooled between her legs.

Robin gripped Regina's hips and rolled, pulling her on top of him, and helped her settle on top of his cock, where she rocked her hips, running him through her growing wetness, and hummed her approval.

He flexed his fingers at her hips, gripping and releasing, but he looked conflicted beneath her, unsure of his touch as she rocked above him. His eyes wandered her body as if seeing it for the first time, and there was a nervous gentleness in the way he touched her, an uncertainty about her and her body, and that just wouldn't do.

"Robin," she said softly, leaning down to press a soft kiss to his lips, "We're okay."

"I know, I just…" He shook his head, closing his eyes. "I broke your trust. You were right, this morning. I lied, and I betrayed you…"

"Hey," She pressed her hands to his cheeks, pulling his gaze back up to her eyes. "I was angry, and hurt, and I was very out of line. I shouldn't have blown up on you. But please, babe, believe me. I do trust you. That's why I wanted you to take the dagger."

"I shouldn't have left you," Robin whispered as he tangled his fingers in her hair. "And I won't again, not ever. I'm with you, I promise."

Regina smiled down at him, a bright, warm, goofy smile that she feared would now be reserved for Henry alone, and for a moment, she felt light, free from the darkness that was holding her heart.

"I love you," she whispered, and God how she meant it. She loved him, truly, and deeply, and could feel it warm and bright, a steady heat inside her very soul. And she could see that he felt it too, the spread of love through every vein as he looked up at her, before he ever muttered the words _I love you, too._

"Now stop being sad," Regina teased, rolling her hips and pulling a groan from Robin. "And fuck me properly."

"Yes, your majesty," He teased back, and Regina wapped him on the shoulder, light and playful, before leaning down to suck on the sensitive spot behind his ear, the one that always earned her a soft moan in response.

She reached between them and gave Robin a few hard strokes before lining him up with her entrance and sinking down slowly, taking in a little bit of him before lifting off, and repeating slowly.

"Love, you don't have to start like this," Robin pushed on her hips, lifting her off of him, and Regina made a sound in protest. "You've had a hell of a day, you certainly deserve a little foreplay."

Regina smiled but shook her head. "No, no, I'm good, I just want…" He released her hips and let her sink down on him again, taking him fully inside her before she stopped for a moment, closing her eyes at the feel of him stretching and filling her. "I just want this."

She rolled her hips, not quite lifting herself up to pull him out, but rather rocking back and forth, enjoying the friction she felt in the subtle motion. Robin bit his lip and slid a hand up her torso to squeeze her breast, pinching her nipple, and a spark of pleasure spread through her chest. She nodded at him, encouraging him, and he kneaded her breast while she rocked above him, gradually picking up speed, growing wetter with each pass of her hips over his.

"So gorgeous," he muttered, palming her breast a little more forcefully while he pushed his hips up into her, thrusting hard once, and oh yes, it was good. She let out a moan, loud and sudden, and he did it again, and she dropped her head back, lifted herself up to meet him when she came back down harder than before. "Like that?" He asked, and she nodded quickly.

Regina leaned forward, pressed her hands against the wall to get better leverage, and met Robin on every thrust, letting every moan and sigh fall freely as he pushed up into her. The angle was better, he was hitting the right spot in her, and it sent wave after wave through her as she moved faster and faster, chasing the pleasure that zinged through her core.

She focused on the feeling of Robin beneath her, on nothing but _fuck yes_ and _faster_ , and she pushed down into him, harder and more demanding with each thrust. Her breasts were pushed to his face, and he took the opportunity to suck a nipple between his teeth, tugging hard and making her hiss before she encouraged him, moaning a strangled "Yes, yes, just like that."

Her legs started to tremble, though it was less of a pleasured shaking and more exhaustion. Her limbs felt weak, and with every pump into her, she felt less steady, like she might collapse. Her arms began to shake, too, and her hands fell from the wall, landing on either side of Robin's head while she fell forward, gasping and too weak to lift herself up again.

Robin froze, wrapped his arms around her back, and tried to lean away and look at her face. "Regina? Are you okay?"

She couldn't respond, was too weak to do anything but grunt between her gasps for air, and Robin moved to slip out of her. She groaned her displeasure, but let Robin roll her back to her side so she was facing him.

"You're too tired for this," Robin said softly, brushing Regina's hair out of her face to look her in the eye. She shook her head, and pulled his lips to hers, trying to kiss him with enough passion to reignite the spark she had lost, but Robin laughed against her lips and pulled her off of him.

"No, no, I'm not." She tried to sound confident, but her voice was wavering and as weak as she felt, and Robin didn't miss it.

"We have the rest of our lives for this, love," He said quietly, brushing his fingers through her hair in soothing passes. "For now, just relax."

She wanted to fight, to insist that she needed this, needed the release, but every second she spent laying next to him, her body felt heavier, as if she was being pulled into the soft pillows and blankets, so she relented, and nuzzled into Robin further, pressing her nose into the crook of his neck and tangling her legs with his.

She felt his erection bump against her stomach, and she chuckled, reached down to stroke him once, and whispered, "sorry about that."

He laughed in response, and shook his head before burying his nose in her hair. "If blue balls is the worse thing you give me, I'd say we're doing just fine."

Regina laughed in earnest, pulled him tighter against her, and hummed into the warmth of his bare skin against hers.

Soon enough, Robin's breathing fell deeper, slower, and she was sure he fell asleep. She was wrapped in his arms, tucked against his body perfectly, and she found that, despite everything, she was perfectly content.

She closed her eyes and ran her hand up and down Robin's back, drawing patterns along his skin, while a bright white flashed across her eyelids. The darkness of her chambers was gone, and she saw an open field, bright greens and blues swirling around her as she watched Robin running through the tall grass, chasing a shrieking Roland. He picked his son up and spun around in circles until they collapsed together, all laughs and shrieks and pure joy. She chuckled and turned to her right, seeing Henry sitting off to the side with a young girl in his lap, no older than 2 years old, bright red curls and even brighter blue eyes shining in the sunlight as they both looked at Henry's storybook in front of them. He was reading to her, he must be, Regina could see his mouth moving, and could hear the short laughs of the little girl as she listened to Henry's story.

Off in the distance, Regina could just make out Emma and Killian, laughing together as they chased each other on horseback, while Snow and David stood behind them, next to their own horses that stopped for a drink in the spring running along the field.

There was a distinct warmth in her heart, something whole, something _complete_ , as she looked at the people around her. Her family, the people who loved her, who would save her from this darkness forever tethered to her soul, they brought her an unending amount of joy, a love she never thought possible for her.

The vision was gone as soon as it had appeared, and Regina didn't open her eyes, but rather snuggled closer to Robin, stealing his warmth as he slept beside her while she replayed the vision in her mind, dreaming that, of all the futures she had seen, this was the one that would stick.


End file.
